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THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 



THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 



THE TECHNOLOGY OF HAPPINESS — APPLIED 

BEING BOOK III OF 

"THE ECONOMY OF HAPPINESS" 



By 
JAMES MACKAYE 



" O happiness ! our being's end and aim, 
Good, pleasure, ease, content! whate'er thy name: 
That something still which prompts the eternal sigh, 
For which we bear to live or dare to die." 

— Pope 



BOSTON 

LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY 

1906 






LISKAnY of CONGRESS 


Two Copies HeceivwJ 

OCT 17 1906 


Ceoyrlfht Entry 
CLASS CL XXc.No, 

/cT<f ^ // 

COPY B. 



Copyright, 1906, 
Bl JAMES M.\('K. WE. 



All Right* Reserved 



Published October, 1906 



A II RED Mi I'M A & 'N, I V. 
If 188.. U. S. \ . 



PREFACE OP 
"THE ECONOMY OF HAPPINESS." 

The philosophy of common sense had its origin in ancient 
Greece, its most conspicuous expositor during antiquity being 
Aristotle. In modern times its development has been due almost 
entirely to the English philosophers of the 17th and 18th cen- 
turies, of whom Hobbes, Locke, Berkeley, Hume and Bentham 
are the chief representatives, the so-called " common sense " 
metaphysic of Eeid and Hamilton embodying a doctrine less 
worthy of such a designation than that of their prof ounder prede- 
cessors, Berkeley and Hume. The present work aims to be a 
contribution to the English school of philosophy. 

The industrial renaissance which began with the 19th century 
initiated a critical period in the political philosophy of the 
western world. Two divergent avenues of development had 
been proposed in the latter part of the 18th century — one by 
Adam Smith in "The Wealth of Nations," which appeared in 
1776 — the other by Jeremy Bentham in "The Principles of 
Morals and Legislation," which appeared in 1789. The first 
led to commercialism — the second to utilitarianism. At this 
critical period arose the dominant political thinker of the 19th 
century — John Stuart Mill. It was for him to determine the 
trend of political thought of the century. He determined it. 
Failing to appreciate Bentham's discovery of the nature of 
intuitionism, Mill evolved an inconsistent theory of utility en- 
tirely incapable of application. Thus deflected from the path 
of common sense, and influenced, no doubt, by the ideals of his 
age, Mill followed Adam Smith into commercialism and per- 
petuated the separation of politics and morality. 

In this manner it has come about that the prevailing school 
of political philosophy has but one God — Production, and Mill 
is its prophet. He who seeks the overthrow of our present 
political paganism therefore must deal with the arch-offender 
himself, and hence in the following work Mill appears as the 
spokesman of his school. It is easy to destroy the dogmas of 
commercialism, but not easy to construct a practical substitute 

v 



yi PHEFA4 E 

for them; jrel nothing Less ifl required of him who would guide 
the practices of Bociety by the theory of utility. In submitting 

riticism the system herein expounded, therefore, I d 
myself entitled to a judgment which will weigh the difficulties 
of the attempt in the same scale with its defei 

James MacKaye. 
Cambridge Mass., March 10, 1906. 



INTRODUCTION 



As the present work is but the sequel to a larger one, an ade- 
quate comprehension of it requires a brief summary of the sub- 
stance of the preceding books. There are two of these; the first 
entitled " The Principles of Common Sense," the second " The 
Technology of Happiness — Theoretical." The third book is 
here published separately, because of its greater popular interest, 
the hope being that by this procedure it may reach a wider circle 
of readers than would care to read the larger work. 

In the introduction to that work the claim is made that the 
omnipresent problem of happiness is solvable by common sense 
and by common sense alone. Hence as a preliminary to the solu- 
tion of that problem it is necessary to discover the principles of 
common sense, and these may only be revealed, by revealing first 
the nature of intelligibility, second the nature of truth, and 
third the nature of utility. 

As the object of our undertaking is to establish rules for the 
guidance of society it is at the outset essential that we shall know 
what society is, or ought to be, trying to do. Until we know 
definitely the goal of human effort any attempt to say how that 
goal is to be reached must be forever futile. Now there is but 
one thing for society to do in order to attain its goal and that is 
to do right. Hence the first task of common sense is to eluci- 
date the meaning of the word right. He who attempts to do 
this, however, will shortly discover that certain preliminary in- 
vestigations are necessary, and the first of these is an examination 
into the meaning of the word meaning itself. This constitutes 
the problem of the nature of intelligibility, and with it the first 
chapter of Book I is concerned. 

But the elucidation of the nature of intelligibility is not the 
only preliminary required. When a man or a community of 
men does anything — performs any voluntary act — it is obvious 
that the object or end for the accomplishment of which the act 
is performed must be a future object or end, since the past is 
beyond the possibility of alteration by any act whatever. An 



viii [NTRODDCTION 

which has any deliberate must bo ono which con- 

templates a futu \ and without knowledge of how efl 

illy relat without Borne meth< 

the future — it is in • to adapt the means of a man 

community of men to their ends. As men are not omnia 
they can oever be certain of t! ijieir act-, and are 

ending upon probabilities 
or presumptions. E< econd preliminary investigation must 

e into the meaning of the word presumption. This consti- 
- ili«' problem of the nature of truth, and the second chapter 
cerned with Buch an investigation. It is in that 
ter maintained that only one successful method of estab- 
lishing presumptions — of forecasting the future — has ever 

rered, namely the inductive^ or scientific method, and that 
its principles are identical with those of common - 

Having established the theory of probabilities in the second 
chapter, the nexi Btep is to apply it to human conduct and 
in the third chapter, resulting in the theory of 
utility. It would only be confusing in the shorl space of this 
introduction to attempt a condensation of the principle* 
intelligibility, of truth, and of utility. lie who is inter 
in their exposition may find it in the work already referred to. 
sufficient here to give the meaning of the word right and 
of its correlative wrong to which the investigation of I 
principles leads us; to wit: .1 right act is that act an 
at any ' - Ible whos* s of hap\ 

maximum. A wrong act is any alternative of a right act 
rence to the definition of utility in the appended 
will show that a right acl is simply the most useful act. 

The assertion I iety ought t<> d<> right, and the defini- 

tion <>r ; ; right in the terms specified, is equivalent t<> 

rtion that the object or goal of Bociety ought to be the 
mum production of happim 
It is a matter <A' supreme importance t<> « : whether 

ion thus laid down can he successfully denied, and 
iscuss ! in Chapter <*». r><><>k 11. [t is there 
such a denial lead- inevitably to a dilemma, which 
I ha [the Dili mma of Intuitu \i horn of 

>nd a verbal emasculation. 
• 3 mon, if not universal, is the error which 

in this dilemma thai a brief consideration of its 

Ml lint 1, ( . out of place hero. 

T nd mutually in< at methods are at 

eni in use by the human race for distinguishing between truth 



INTRODUCTION ix 

and untruth, and right and wrong. The first is the method of 
common sense; the second the method of intuitionism. Com- 
mon sense assumes certain universal postulates (five in num- 
ber) as extrinsic criteria, by means of them discovers what is 
true and what is right, and fixes its definitions accordingly. 
Intuitionism assumes that men can discover what is true by 
discovering what they believe, and what is right by discover- 
ing what they approve. The first makes truth and righteous- 
ness the guides to belief and approval. The second makes 
belief and approval the guides to truth and righteousness. 
Intuitionism, indeed, is common sense reversed, or inverted, 
all existing modes of judgment opposed to common sense con- 
stituting but one kind of intuitionism or another, the appar- 
ent variations being, in reality, merely verbal. The assertion 
that rivers flow down hill is the assertion of a truth. We add 
nothing to the truth of this assertion by believing it, and we 
subtract nothing from its truth by disbelieving it. Similarly, 
to practise charity and good will toward all sentient beings 
is to practise righteousness, and we add nothing to the right- 
eousness of such practices by approving them, and subtract 
nothing from their righteousness by disapproving them. 

It is shown in Book II, Chapter 6, that our convictions, 
whether of what is true or what is right, are often, if not gen- 
erally, determined, not by common sense, but by various more 
or less accidental influences to which our minds happen to 
have been subjected while plastic, and that consequently mere 
conviction, however strong, is not a safe guide either to what 
is true or to what is right, and hence that conscience instead 
of being our guide to righteousness, itself requires righteousness 
as a guide. The hanging of witches and the burning of heretics 
by the theological intuitionists of former times were conscien- 
tious acts, but not for that reason right acts. Yet if it be ad- 
mitted, as it generally will be, that many conscientious acts are 
wrong, then it is clear that the test of right must be independent 
of conscience. Consequently moral codes, constituting as they 
do the guides to conscience, cannot themselves be tested by con- 
science, since that would only be an indirect method of guiding 
conscience by itself, tvhich is equivalent to not guiding it at all. 

Nor can the difficulty inherent in intuitionism be escaped by 
falling back upon some supernatural authority as a guide. A 
Mohammedan accepts the authority of the Mohammedan code of 
morals because he approves of accepting it. He rejects the au- 
thority of the Christian code because he approves of rejecting 
it, and the Christian reverses this procedure because he approves 



x INTRODUCTION 

of reversing it In other words men will only accept the author- 
ity of God when they approve of accepting it. Hence their own 
approval is the real criterion, and instead of avoiding the prin- 
ciple of intuitionism by an appeal to supernatural authority they 
merely change its phraseology. Neither is any other mode of 
dired i! ience by conscience of any sen ice, Conscientious- 

ie nol righteousness. The conduct of the man who acts 
upon his impulses of approval or disapproval as they ari 
neither knowing nor caring whether it conforms to any moral 
standard is jusl as likely to be righteous as that of the moralist 
who erects a code of morals upon intuitionism. The only differ- 
ence between the two is that the moralist classifies his approba- 
tions and disapprobations, and the other man does not. 

[gnoring all arbitrary attitudes, it may be said that he who 
ms our definition of right can be discredited by intuitionism 
must take one of two positions. IIo must maintain either: (1) 
That any definition which is disapproved by anyone is discredited, 
Or (2) That any definition which he himself disapproves is dis- 
credited, [f he lakes the first position he maintains that the 
word right can have no meaning, since no definition proposable 
would be approved by all persons. If he taki second p 

tien he maintains that the meaning of the word was unknowable 
in the period before he was horn, since the test of his approval 
was not at that period available. r>oth these positions are absurd. 
Hence we must conclude that a definition of right cannot ho 
redited by anyone's disapproval of it. This, however, necessi- 
tates the conclusion that it cannot be sustained by anyone's ap- 
proval of it. Therefore, a definition which would escape the 
charge of absurdity must be independent of the approval or dis- 
approval <>f any man or community of men. The definition to 
which we are led by an analysis of common sense fulfils this 
requirement, since, with intuitionism eliminated, the elementary 
sensations designated by the terms pleasure and pain are the 
only one- which have the slightest interesl to sentienl beings — 
they are the only ones which retain their importance independent 
of all variation in men's approval and disapproval — ami to the 
formulation of a criterion of conduct which recognizes this 

unique independence the first hook of "The Economy of Happi- 
yotecL 
Saving in Book T established our criterion of right ^o firmly 

that its denial leaves only a choice between absurdities our m 
task Lb to employ it as a practical guide to conduct. Having dis- 

what the goal of BOCiety OUghl to he we miM ne\t dis- 

COVer how to attain it, and this constitutes the problem of the 



INTRODUCTION xi 

technology of happiness; for if society would successfully adapt 
the means of happiness afforded by terrestrial conditions to its 
end it must follow the methods of technology or applied common 
sense. To learn how the problem of happiness should be formu- 
lated then, let us consider an analogous problem in steam engi- 
neering technology. 

Should a steam engineer have presented to him the problem 
of producing as great a quantity of steam as possible from a given 
domain affording coal and water he would discover that three 
factors of steam generation require consideration. First, the 
steam producing mechanism or boiler within which steam is to 
be generated. Second, the adjustment or adaptation of said boiler 
to the conditions of steam generation imposed by chemical and 
thermal laws, and by the resources in fuel and water available. 
Third, the number of boilers required to consume the available 
coal output with maximum efficiency of adaptation per boiler. 
The happiness engineer has presented to him a similar problem. 
He is required to produce the maximum quantity of happiness 
which it is possible to produce from the potentialities of happiness 
inherent in terrestrial conditions, and similarly must consider 
three factors. First, the happiness producing mechanism, or 
sentient organism in whose sensorium happiness is to be gener- 
ated. Second, the adjustment or adaptation of said organism 
to the conditions of happiness generation imposed by the laws of 
nature and human nature, and by the natural resources available. 
Third, the number of organisms required to consume the avail- 
able resources with maximum efficiency of adaptation per capita. 

In Book II each of these factors of happiness is discussed 
separately. In the second chapter (Chapter 6 of " The Economy 
of Happiness") are discussed what qualities or characteristics of 
men will meet the conditions required for a high efficiency of 
conversion (See Glossary), and the means afforded by nature 
for acquiring them. These means may be divided into (1) 
Those afforded by inheritance, and (2) Those afforded by edu- 
cation, and to a discussion of the fundamentals of these two 
topics the chapter on the first factor of happiness is mainly de- 
voted. The subject of intuitionism vs. common sense is treated 
in this chapter rather than in Book I because it is the most im- 
portant of educational questions. 

Chapter 7 is devoted to the consideration of the adjustment 
required between men and their environment in order that maxi- 
mum efficiency of adaptation per capita may be attained, and 
thus more than any other part of the work treats of economic 
questions. In order to shift the standpoint of criticism from 



xii INTRODUCTION 

that of commercialisii) to thai of utilitarianism a new nomencla- 
ture is required and supplied, and the theoretically economic 
relations between the two main classes of useful acts (consump- 
tion and production) are developed. 

In Chapter 8 are considered the conditions imposed by the 
laws of nature and of human nature which determine the popu- 
lation required to maintain the maximum efficiency of adaptation 
with given oatural resources, and a given average efficiency of 
conversion; and the chapter closes by formulating from the 
principles developed in the discussion of the three factors, eight 
proximate criteria — called the clement* of happiness — by 
means of which the adaptation of any social system or mechan- 
ism to the end of utility may be tested. Thus a just social system 
should fulfil the following eight requirements: 

(1) It should promote the development of a high quality of 
sentient agent, the characteristics required being intelligence. 
altruism and will. 

(2) It should promote the adjustability and health of 
agent. 

(3) It should husband natural resources while the efficiency 
of consumption is low. 

(1) It should promote the employment of machinery in pro- 
duction as a substitute for men. 

(5) It should stimulate the skill and interest applied to the 
employment of said machinery. 

(<*)) It should promote the equality of distribution of wealth 
and leisure. 

(*! ) It should tend lo maintain the indicative ratio at the 
point of maximum efficiency y^v capita. 

(8) It should lend to maintain the population at the point 
of beneficent equilibrium. 

It is the criteria thus enumerated that arc systematically 
applied in the essay to follow as tests of the social Bystem. 

Book II closes with a discussion of the nature of liberty and 
its relation io utility. In this discussion an additional criterion 
leveloped — the adaptive principle — which as an auxiliary 
t«» ti I forth above is useful as a test of social systems. 

isting or proposed. 

Any social system capable of meeting the tests imposed by the 
eighl elements of happiness will of necessity possess two charac- 
teristics: First, its means will he those determined by the method 
of Bcience or common sense. Second, its end will be that ^\' 
utility. I desire to comment briefly upon each of these charac- 
teristics; and to contrast them with their antitheses. 



INTRODUCTION xiii 

First as to the means. The method of science is to be distin- 
guished from that of intuitionism by its acknowledgment of 
fallibility. The moral dicta of intuitionism profess to be im- 
mutable — incapable of improvement. They are characterized 
by a finality only to be expected in omniscience. The dicta of 
science, on the other hand, are provisional, capable of develop- 
ment or growth. They do not profess to carry with them an 
authority greater than that which attaches to the mature judg- 
ment of fallible beings. The moral codes of intuitionism claim 
to be products of revelation, or inspiration, embodying the final 
word that can be spoken on the subject. To change them is to 
destroy them. The moral code of science claims to be the product 
of human experience, capable of expanding as experience ex- 
pands, and growing with the growth of science. To change it in 
conformity with the new truths which research may reveal is to 
improve it. The advancement, of knowledge* leaves the precepts 
of intuitionism unaffected, because they are the products of ig- 
norance. It continually improves the adaptation of the precepts 
of science to their end, because they are the products of knowl- 
edge. Intuitionism furnishes the mediceval criteria of truth and 
of righteousness. Science or common sense furnishes the modem 
criteria. The first embodies the method of the past. The second 
the method of the future. 

Second as to the end. The politics of utility, which is but 
the application of the utilitarian or common sense standard of 
morals to political conduct, seeks, of course, the end of utility, 
but owing to a widespread misunderstanding of the term utili- 
tarianism this end is commonly misapprehended, and is supposed 
to be a purely material or worldly one. Such a supposition ex- 
actly reverses the truth. Those subject to the misapprehension 
have in mind, not utilitarianism, but commercialism, whose ends 
are purely material and — considered as ultimate ends — com- 
pletely valueless. The only interests of sentient beings recognized 
by the theory of utility are those involved in the attainment 
of pleasure and the avoidance of pain. The so-called material 
interests of mankind with which commercialism is alone con- 
cerned are worth attention only as they may bear a causal relation 
to pleasure and pain. Commercialism would sacrifice everything 
— including happiness — to the attainment of wealth. Utilita- 
rianism would sacrifice everything — including wealth — to the 
attainment of happiness. Thus are the politics of commerce 
which characterize our day to be fundamentally distinguished 
from the politics of utility which will characterize that of our 
posterity. 



GLOSSARY 



The terms comprised in the following list include those occur- 
ring in this essay in an unfamiliar or special meaning. Many 
of them cannot be adequately explained without extensive expo- 
sition, and for their complete understanding it will be necessary 
to consult the larger work; but the brief explanations here given 
will probably suffice for the comprehension of the present essay. 
The associated numbers refer to the pages in " The Economy of 
Happiness " where the subject referred to is treated. 

Accelerative operation or policy. One which produces such 
changes in the system operated upon as to modify the effects of 
its continued operation. It is beneficent, if yielding a progres- 
sively better result: maleficent, if yielding a progressively worse 
result. 180. 

Adaptive principle. The principle employed in controlling 
the conduct of men by appeal to their self-interest. It is positive, 
when the control is through a promise of pleasure: negative, 
when the control is through a promise of pain. The principle 
underlying the efficacy of law. 341. 

Adjustability. That quality of a sentient being which deter- 
mines the amount of happiness that he may experience under 
given external conditions. Specifically, the capacity of a sentient 
being to adapt his tastes and needs to the available means of 
satisfying them. 197. 

Avocality. Absence of meaning. 31. 

Belief -judgment. See Peithosyllogism. 

Beneficent equilibrium. The state of a population whose 
numbers are so related to its means of happiness that a condition 
of maximum efficiency of adaptation per capita is maintained 
among them. 322. 

Certainty. (1) An expectation the contradictory of which 
is unexpectable, or incapable of being admitted as true. (2) 
The contradiction of a contradiction. 44. 

Chresyllogism. Use-judgment. The mental operation by 
which the utility of acts or alternatives is tested. The expres- 
sion of such an operation. , 131-140. 



xvi GLOSSARY 

Common sense. The modes of judgment having their origin 
in universal experience, independent of localization in -pare or 
time: those employed by science: and by normal human beh 
in their common affairs. 7—184. 

Consuming ratio. The proportional part of any life inter- 
val -pent in consumption. 21 1. 

Consumption. One of the two primary classes of useful 
acts, prodm Hon being the other. Acts whose immediate or direct 
etl'eet is designed to be: (1) An increase of happiness — r ■- 
consumption. (2) A decrease of onhappiness — negative eon- 
sumption. Acts whose immediate end is ultimate. 268. 

Consumptive capacity or power. The amount of happi- 
ness achievable by an individual or assemblage thereof by the 
consumption of a given amount of wealth in a given time. 399. 

Desideratum. Any means other than an act which may 
be employed to achieve a Burplus of pleasure or avoid a surplus 
of pain. 269. 

Dogmatism. [ntuitionism originating in proteromania. 
The commonest form of int uitionism. 243—265. 

Efficiency of adaptation. The ratio of the amount of 
happiness yielded by the reaction of a given environment upon 
an individual or community, of given efficiency of conversion, 

to the amount which might he yielded. The measure of the 

tve of success in adjusting the environment of a community 
to its need- and tastes. It is a function of the efficiency and 
capacity of production and of consumption, and also of the indi- 
cative ratio. The theoretical relation between these five magni- 
tudes required to attain the maximum value o( this rati" 
developed in Chapter 7. 191, 31 l. 

Efficiency of consumption. The ratio of the amount of hap- 
piness produced by the consumption of a given amount of wealth 
to the amount of production required to create it. 299. 

Efficiency of conversion. The ability or capacity p 
by a Bentient being or assemblage of beings for converting the 
potentiality of happiness provided by a given environment into 
actual happiness. 191, 196-199. 

Efficiency of production* The ratio of a given amount of 
production to its labor cost. 279. 

Egotism. The theory or practice of so directing the conduct 
of an individual afl to Berve his own interests alone. L42. 

Error. Deviation from common sense, or the result of Buch 
deviation. It< primary division is into (1) Abnormal deviation, 
or insanity, and (2) Normal deviation, the three classes <^f which 
an- logomania, proteromania, and pathomania. 160-184. 



GLOSSARY xrii 

Fatalism. (1) The theory which maintains that a condition 
of inactivity may not be classed among voluntary acts. (2) The 
theory which identifies inactivity with usefulness. 155-157. 

Happiness, Amount, Quantity, or Surplus of. Amount 
of pleasure or pain: being positive when referring to a surplus of 
pleasure, negative when referring to a surplus of pain. 117. 
See Pleasure. 

Harmfulness. The quality common to acts whose degree of 
utility is negative when alternatives having a positive degree 
of utility are selectable. 145. 

Heclon. A unit of intensity of pleasure. 117. 

Hedon-minute or hour. A unit of quantity of pleasure. 
117. 

Humanitarianism. The theory or practice of so directing 
the conduct of an individual as to serve the interests of his own 
race — the human race — alone. 142. 

Indicative ratio. The ratio of the consuming to the pro- 
ducing ratio. If fixed by the principles of utility, it is the meas- 
ure of an individual's or a community's opportunity for positive 
consumption. 315. 

Intuitionism. (See Introduction.) The theory that belief 
is the test of truth, disbelief the test of untruth; and that ap- 
proval is the test of right and disapproval the test of wrong. 
The assumption underlying all modes of judgment opposed to 
common sense. 104, 162, 243-265. 

Labor cost. The quantity of pain represented by a given 
amount of production. 278. 

Liberty, (1) Legal. A magnitude inversely proportional to 
the number of alternatives prohibited by law. The reciprocal 
of legal restraint. 341. (2) Nominal. A magnitude propor- 
tional to the number of useful alternatives selectable per unit of 
time. (3) Real. A magnitude proportional to opportunity for 
happiness per unit of time. 335. 

Logomania. Word-madness. The type of normal devia- 
tion from common sense arising from the substitution of the 
symbols of impressions or ideas required in the exercise of judg- 
ment for impressions or ideas themselves. 160. 

Machine. Any means of production, exclusive of the ma- 
terials thereof, the human body and faculties, the earth, and the 
forces of nature. 284. 

Mean surplus. The product of the probability of a con- 
tingency into its probable surplus. The probable quantity of 
happiness — positive or negative — attributable to a given con- 
tingency from the selection of an alternative including that con- 
tingency. 133. 



-vrfli GLOSSARY 

Non-sentient factor of production* A non-sentient pro- 
ductive agency. Specifically, a machine which engages in pro- 
duction, 288. 

CEciotism* The theory or practice of so directing the con- 
duct of an individual as to Berve the interests of his own family 

alone. L42. 

Oyerconsumption, Zone of. The diagrammatiG represen- 
tation of a condition of Bociety in which the margin of self-sup- 
port La negative because of too great a producing ratio. 308. 

Pain. An indefinable, but exemplifiable, Bimple perception 
common to experiences designated painful 105. Intensity of. 
An indefinable, but exemplifiable, mode of variation of pain. 
107, 112. Amount or Quantity of. The product of an in- 
tensity of pain into a duration. .1 1 1. 

Pathoniania. Sensibility-madness. The type n\' norma] de- 
viation from common sense arising from the substitution of 
emotion, or feeling, for reasonableness as a test of probability 
or utility. 1G3. 

Pathon. A unit of intensity of pain. 111. 

Pathon-minute or hour. A unit of quantity of pain. 
11 1. 

Patriotism. The theory or practice of so directing the con- 
duct of an individual as to serve the interests of his own country 
alone. 142. 

Peithosyllogism. i Belief-judgment The mental operation 
by which the probability of expectations or beliefs is tested. The 
expression of such an operation. 79. 

Phyliotism. The theory or practice of so directing the con- 
duct of an individual as to serve the interests of his own tribe, 
party, or elan alone. l 12. 

Pleasure. An indefinable, bul exemplifiable, simple percep- 
t ion common to experiences designated pleasurable. 105. Inten- 
sity <>f. An indefinable, but exemplifiable, mode of variation of 
pleasure. 107. Amount or Quantity of. The product of an 
intensify of pleasure into a duration. 1 14. 

Practomania. Production-madness. The type of deviation 
from common sense which consists in mistaking the object of 
production; deeming it the end of, instead of the means to, 
consumption. Systematized into a science it constitutes the 
orthodox theory of political economy, the application of which 

i This term It not a fortunate one. i raggest as ■ substitute the term ettetjfffaytow 

(Gr. ti*4r as probability : ovXXoytouAc = Judgment)! or probability-judgment, such a 
terminology i» more consistent with the term chrcsyiiogism % designating a use of 
DtUlty-Jndgment; since probability ooonples ■ position in logical theory analogous to 

that of utility Ifl ethical theory. 



GLOSSARY xix 

to political conduct results in the prevailing commercialism. It 
is a local and derivative variety of mania having its origin in 
logomania and proteromania. 176. 

Presumption of happiness. The presumable amount of 
happiness which will result from selecting an alternative. The 
algebraic sum of the mean surpluses of the several contingencies 
of an alternative. 135. 

Probability, (1) The measure of the frequency of fulfilment 
of an expectation, as determined by a belief-judgment. The 
numerical value of such a judgment. 63. (2) The common 
quality of expectations having a probability (1) greater than 
one-half. Truth. 79. 

Probable surplus. The quantity of happiness — positive 
or negative — which will probably result from the occurrence of 
a given contingency. 133. 

Producing 1 ratio. The proportional part of any life interval 
spent in production. 271. 

Production. One of the two primary classes of useful acts, 
consumption being the other. Acts whose mediate or indirect 
effect is designed to be: (1) An increase of happiness — positive 
production. (2) A decrease of unhappiness — negative produc- 
tion. Acts whose immediate end is proximate. 268. Indi- 
vidualistic. Such as is confined to one individual. Involving 
no division of labor or essential co-operation between individuals. 
285. Socialistic. Such as is shared in by several individuals. 
Involving division of labor and essential co-operation between 
individuals. 286. Amount of. The labor cost of altering a 
system from a specified initial to a specified final condition under 
given conditions of efficiency of conversion and of the productive 
arts. 279. 

Production-madness. See Practomania. 

Productive capacity or power. The amount of production 
achievable by an individual or assemblage thereof in a given 
time. 279. 

Proteromania. Priority-madness. The type of normal 
deviation from common sense arising from the substitution of 
priority of lodgment in the mind for reasonableness as a test of 
probability or utility. 162. 

Right. Having the quality of Tightness. 143. 

Rightness. (See Introduction.) Eighteousness. The qual- 
ity common to acts or alternatives of maximum utility. 143. 

Self-sufficiency. The condition obtaining when a produc- 
tive and consumptive agency — e.g., an individual or family — * 
produces the equivalent of what it consumes. 310, 



XX 



GLOSSARY 



Self-rapport. (1) The conditioo obtaining when the surplus 
of pleasure achieved, or Burplus of pain avoided, by tl • 
sumption of given erata {i.e., their consumptr is 

equivalenl t«», or greater than, the surplus of pain represented in 

eir production. (2) The condition common to any assem- 
• of aii- whose surplus of happiness is neutral or posil 
Margin of- ( 1 | The Burplus of happiness resulting from 
the production and consumption of given desiderata. (2) The 
Burplus of happiness resulting from any assemblag It 

is positive if the Burplus is one of pleasure, negative if it is one 
of pain. 273. Zone of. The diagrammatic representation of 
a condition of society in which production is bo related to con- 
sumption as to result in a positive margin of self-support 

Sentient factor <>f production. A sentient productive 
. Specifically, a human being who engages in production. 

Truth. (1) Idio common quality of expectations having a 
probability greater than one-half. (2) A proposition expressive 
of an expectation having a high degree of probability. 64, 69. 

Utilitarianism. (See Introduction.) The theory or practice 
of BO directing the conduct of an individual as to serve the 
interests of nil sentient beings, irrespective of the relations, peiv 
Bonal, political, social, racial, or otherwise, borne by said beings 
to himself. The theory which makes the greatest totality of 
happiness the aim of human effort. 1 12. 

Utility. (1 ) The measure of the amount of happiness which 
will resull from the selection of an alternative, as determined by 
a use-judgment. The numerical value of the presumption of hap- 
piness of an alternative a- bo determined. 1 1<>. ( 2 I Useful] 
The common quality of acts or alternatives whose utility (1 » is 

ater than that of the act or alternative of minimum activity, 
Bave when the utility (1) of said act is a maximum, in which 

- ■ it is the quality distinguishing said act or alternative from 
all others. 145. End or object of. The maximum surplus, 
or output, of happiness achievable by voluntary acts. The ideal 

of utilitarianism. 183. 

I n<ler<'onsumption. Zone of. 'The diagrammatic repre- 

tation of a condition of society in which the margin of self- 

Bupporl is negative because of too low a rate of consumption. 

Unhappineas. See Pain. 

Usefulness, See Utility. 

i se-jndgment, See Onresyllogism, 



GLOSSARY xxi 

Uselessness. Inutility. The common quality of acts whose 
degree of utility is less than that of useful acts. 145. 

Verbal emasculation. The employment of the conspicuous 
and apparently important terms of a language in inconsequential 
meanings. The variety of logomania which misleads the judg- 
ment by attributing importance to unimportant objects of, or dis- 
tinctions in, experience, through their representation by terms 
rendered conspicuous by usage. 162. 

Wasted ratio. The proportional part of any life interval 
spent neither in consumption nor production. 271. 

Wealth. External desiderata sufficiently limited in avail- 
ability to have a value in exchange. 270. Amount of. The 
amount of production represented in the creation of. 279. 

Wrong 1 . Having the quality of wrongness. 143. 

Wrongness. (See Introduction.) Unrighteousness. The 
quality common to the alternatives of right acts or alternatives. 
143. 



THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

CHAPTER I 

THE SOCIAL MECHANISM 

In seeking the solution of the problem of happiness the tin- 
changeable laws of creation are our only limitations. In the 
preceding book we have been engaged in examining the most 
vital of those laws in order to deduce from them criteria from 
which to evolve, and by which to test, means adapted to the 
solution of that problem. This examination has led to the sub- 
stitution of eight criteria for one as a guide to the conduct of 
society, with an accompanying loss in generality, but a more 
than compensating gain in concreteness. The first stage of our 
task is thus completed — we have formulated the theory of the 
technology of happiness — we must now apply it — we have 
gained in concreteness, but we have not gained enough. Me- 
chanical technology is not confined to the consideration of 
statics, kinematics, and kinetics — these merely embody the 
theory of the subject. Applied mechanics concerns itself with 
the practice of that theory — with the application of mechanical 
laws to concrete material mechanisms. Similarly, the technology 
of happiness is not confined to the mere theory of the subject. 
To attain the usefulness of which it is capable it must direct 
itself to the practice of that theory — to the application of the 
appropriate laws of nature and human nature to concrete non- 
material mechanisms — to social systems — whose modes of op- 
eration must be adjudged good or bad according as they are 
adapted or unadapted to achieve the object of utility. In the 
present book I intend thus to apply the theory formulated in 
Book II directly to the conduct of society — to exhibit it as an 
actual working test of proposed or practised policies. 

The future conduct of society must and will consist of some 
definite assemblage of voluntary acts occurring in a definite 

1 



2 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

order of su a, and while the law of causation remains in- 

tact the oid pul of ha] ill be a Function of its 

luct. 1 that 

amber of congeries - which might con- 

trol equally ada] I ilie 

utility, hut thai some 

it is clear that to guii I of 

iety toward utility and away from inutility would be a c - 

fu] thing to do. Bui to guide society in any direction [g to do 

nor less than to control its acts, and to i 
control, a means of exercising it musl be available. Two i 
tinct n of exercising control over the conducl 

arc proposable: (1) The anarchical: (2) the non-anai 

The anarchical method consists simply in leaving everyl 
to nature, permitting each individual to do as he ; and 

follow his own impulses which, as they impel him toward per- 
sonal pleasure and away from personal pain, will tend — accord- 
ing to the anarchist — on the whole, to attain the end of utility. 
Anarchy requires the absence of all artificial control of the c - 
dm iety. The objections to this method arc sufficiently 

treated in other portions o\' this work. 

A.8 the anarchical method of control is control by nature alone, 
the only alternative to it must be some method in which men 
voluntarily modify the course of nature in order to deflect the 
iety in a greater or less \ from that which 

would resull under anarchy. The device, or instrument, by 
mean- of which this is accomplished is known as government. 
The non-anarchical methods of control may be divided into two 
classes: (1) The oligarchical: (2) The democrai 

Tl e firsl method consists in controlling the conduct of society 
in conformity with the approval or disapproval of some }^'v- 
or class of persons, constituting a small fraction of the total, tl 
n of said person or persons being determined by some 
er than the will of society itself. Oligarchy r 
thai the conduct of society shall be subject to artificial contr 
but that said control shall not be exercised by society. The 
of oligarchical control is autocratic control, the 
approval or disapproval of a Bingle person controlling public 
■duct. Oligarchical control i ernmenl is practically uni- 

rsal at the presenl time. It is typical of all forms of mon- 
hy, and is an essential feature thereof. It is also typical of 
all actual examples of democracy, though it is not an essential 

'ire then 



THE SOCIAL MECHANISM 3 

Were it possible to so select the ruling body in an oligarchy 
that its inclinations were identical, or approximately identical, 
with those of Justice, this form of control would be a just one. 
But no method of doing this has ever been proposed. Thus some 
form of control which consults the will and interest of the 
persons controlled is preferable. As Leibnitz says : " Men will 
prefer to have their own will, and look themselves after their 
own welfare, until they have confidence in the supreme wisdom 
and power of their rulers." In an oligarchy there is no pre- 
sumption that the approval or disapproval which constitutes the 
guide to social conduct will be identical with that of Justice, or 
even approximately so. This is the peculiar defect of oligarch- 
ical control, and it is manifest throughout all history, and never 
more manifest than at the present time. 

The second or democratic method consists in making the ap- 
proval or disapproval of a majority of the adults (usually the 
male adults) of a community, the test of what the community 
as a whole shall do. The theory of democratic control is simple. 
The nearest approach possible to the will of Justice will be the 
will of that portion of society capable of employing common 
sense as a guide to conduct. Hence their control will approx- 
imate more closely to the control of Justice than that of any 
portion selected by other means. The Declaration of Inde- 
pendence affirms that governments derive " their just powers 
from the consent of the governed," and no other just source of 
governmental power has ever been consistently maintained. 
Democracy requires that conduct affecting the interests of society 
shall be controlled by society. 

Any attempt to put the theory of democracy into practice, 
however, encounters serious obstacles. The difficulty of dis- 
tinguishing those who are capable of exercising judgment from 
those who are not is such that distinctions so loosely approximate 
as to be almost arbitrary have to be resorted to. Thus the 
separation of voters from non-voters by an arbitrary age limit is 
a very unsatisfactory expedient, and the employment of sex as a 
distinction is still less defensible. Another difficulty arises from 
the great number of persons whose will is the source of control. 
In small communities, such as the towns of New England, it is 
practical for the whole voting community to meet in one spot 
and express their will, but in large communities this is im- 
possible — hence the. resort to representative government, in 
which communities are represented by individuals, who them- 
selves exercise control. The introduction of this expedient, 



4 THE POLITICS OF I'TILI'I V 

rnmenl oakes 

m rolling its govern- 
• . and in i ommunity I rsons 

willii to do tl tis, in order to further their own 

interests. Thus far every attempt at the application of the 
dem< ntrol has been thwarted by the activity 

of such Belf-seeking i ; hence all democracies are, in reality, 

d oligarchies. Whether we consid 
in ancienl times, or the United States of America in 
era times, the same deterioration of democracy into oli- 
garchy is to be observed. There arc plenty of nominal d( 
racies in the world, bu1 qo real ones. WThatever the form of 
government, il is probable that any community divided into two 
or more of antagonistic interests will sooner or later be- 

e of the oligarchical type; though it is noi to be denied that 
a mechanism sufficiently adapted to the expression of the people's 
will might prevenl this. It is no pari of the purpose of this 
work to enter into a general discussion of the proper structure 
of such a mechanism, though it may be remarked in passing 
means are proposable much better adapted to this end than 
any now practised. 

Among the mosl important of them are the Initiative and ref- 
: 'im. constituting means whereby an approximation to direct 
ation may he secured. These devices are. in reality, ex- 
tensions of the town meeting principle, whereby the people vote 
directly lei- measures, instead of \'ov men. and thus legislafc 
themselves instead of trusting to the readily deranged and cor- 
rupted representative system. The details of the initiative and 
referendum I -hall not discuss here — they are capable of much 
variation and have stood the tegt of long trial — notably in 
tzerland. Every democracy should adopt them as the most 
i( nt means yel proposed of preventing lapse into oligarchy, 
referendum has hen occasionally employed in this country 
- and municipalities, and it is one of the means ]^v^- 
scribed in ' Federal Constitution for securing amendmenl 

-■anient. No evils have thus Ear developed in its em- 
i fad thai in many instances of the use of the 
m ;i majority of the voters have not troubled them- 
>rd their preferences has often been cited ;i- a r< 
rt unit y to record them should be denied the f>. 
h ;i criticism is Bhallow. . Because a maj 

its preferences on some matter in which 
□ for believing that it does 



THE SOCIAL MECHANISM 

not care to express them on matters in which it is interested. 
Whenever the measures on which the people are called upon to 
directly decide have an essential relation to their happiness they 
will take sufficient interest to vote upon them, and the state in 
which the opportunity to do so is denied them has but an in- 
ferior claim to the name of a democracy. As a supplement to 
direct legislation, an indirect system is essential in all large 
communities, but as the sole means of transcribing the will of 
the people into law it is imperfect and unsafe. The present 
party system in the United States, for example, is but a 
bungling affair, and self-seekers have not usually, encountered 
much difficulty in using it to defeat the people's will. Despite 
its defects, the democratic theory is the only reasonable one thus 
far proposed, since no other creates even a moderate presump- 
tion that the control of the conduct of society will be in the 
interests of Justice. 

There is, nevertheless, one serious objection to the democratic 
theory of control, viz., that the interests of a vast majority of 
those affected by the conduct of the present generation are not 
represented in, nor often consulted by, the controlling govern- 
ment. I refer to the interests of posterity, whose right to be 
considered is immeasureably greater than that of any single 
generation. This objection, however, is one which applies to all 
systems and is probably irremediable. Were a system devisable 
which recognized and preserved the paramount rights of poster- 
ity, it would be more just than any yet proposed. Apparently 
the best that can be done is to make manifest to the public in 
how many particulars the interests of one generation are actually 
identical with those of their posterity, and in those particulars 
in which they are not, to trust to the sense of justice which a 
cultivated understanding of the nature of morality tends to 
develop. To trust to the sense of justice of a community will, 
under any system, afford a less presumption of success than to 
trust to its self-interest, but the presumption will be greater 
when morality is subject to the test of common sense than 
when, as at present, it is subject to that of intuition, since to 
make conscience the criterion of right instead of right the 
criterion of conscience is not likely to result in a reign of 
righteousness. 

The anarchical, the oligarchical, and the democratic, forms of 
control are the only distinct forms which have ever been pro- 
posed, but there are many indistinct forms, founded on no 
definite principle and having their origin in the accidents of 



6 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

history. T! i prise all form- in actual practice, and they 

enlist of the first two, or of all three, Forms in combination. It 
would be Futile to attempt to distinguish in what degree the 
three forms or methods of control share in determining the 
conduct of society. The anarchical form, of course, predom- 
inates, d( termining the bulk of all human activities throughout 

the world. 

A- science first encroaches upon intuitionism from the 
materia] side it- effect upon nations emerging from medieval- 
ism is to promote an industrial development out of proportion to 
their moral development. Th<' means of producing desiderata 
are stimulated beyond the capacity of the community to put 
them to useful purposes, and the efficiency of production is in- 
creased Ear more than that of consumption. Thus have arisen 
the greal commercial nations of modern time- — all hands and 
no head — with great capacity for doing things, but without 
capacity to distinguish what things arc useful to do. lake ships 
with huge engines, hut rudderless, they rush feverishly and aim- 
lessly about, not knowing their goal and hem-e powerless to lay 
their course. They use common sense a- a guide to proximate 
end-, hut intuition as a guide to ultimate ends. Thus, materi- 
ally they are modern, hut morally they remain mediaeval. 

In the discussion which follow- I Bhall confine attention to 
social mechanisms which embody the democratic principle of con- 
trol, since no other has any interest to utilitarianism. In the 
particular stage of development in which modern democracies find 
themselves, there are open four forms of social mechanism to 
one or the other of which they must resort. Though there may 
be variation in detail, it i- difficull to see how an industrial state 
not belonging to one or the other of these forms can remain in 
any degree democratic. They may he called in the order of 
their development in time (1) Natural competition, (2) Arti* 
facial competition, (3) Pseudo-socialism, (1) Socialism. I 
shall in the chapters following tesl these alternative form- by 
mean- of the criteria formulated in the preceding hook, and 
from the data thus obtained shall attempt the construction of a 
concrete social mechanism which shall fulfil the requirements of 
common Bense, and be adapted to attain the end of utility. 






CHAPTEE II 

COMPETITION 

Among the proposed methods of attaining the object of society 
is that embodied in competition. It may be contended that 
competition is not a method deliberately employed by society to 
gain its ends, because by simply letting things alone competition 
operates automatically, and hence is not a means voluntarily 
selected, but is something which "just happens." Such a con- 
tention can be allowed only on the supposition that society has 
60 alternative — that no other means of accomplishing her ends 
can be suggested — for it is undeniable that where no alterna- 
tives exist there can be no voluntary act. Such other alterna- 
tives exist, however, and therefore we must regard competition 
as a means deliberately selected by men on account of its sup- 
posed adaptability to the attainment of their ends. The fact 
that it involves inactivity does not make it any the less a volun- 
tarily selected alternative. To let things alone is to exercise 
volition so long as they are let alone voluntarily. To maintain 
otherwise is but the claim of the fatalist, and fatalism in a 
community cannot escape the charge of absurdity on the ground 
that it avoids volition, any more than in an individual. 

The theory of competitive beneficence is a direct corollary of 
the theory of natural beneficence and none is more widely 
accepted and more dogmatically maintained. Competition, we 
are told, is a law of nature and therefore beneficial. Such 
benefit as competition in nature involves may be revealed by a 
brief examination of the subject, for it may be admitted that 
competition is a law of nature in the sense in which writers on 
social topics use that term ; that is, it is a process to be observed 
in nature. Perhaps the character of the perfectly natural 
process cannot be better described than in the words of that 
famous observer of nature — Charles Darwin. In his work on 
the Origin of Species he remarks that " The elder De Candolle 
and Lyell have largely and philosophically shown that all organic 
beings are exposed to severe competition," and adds : " Nothing 
is easier than to admit in words the truth of the universal 

7 



THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

struggle for life." Ee then proceeds to describe the proc 
foll< 

u A struggle for existence inevitably follows from the high rate 
at which all organic beings tend to increase. Every being, which 
during its natural lifetime prodi era! egg da, must 

i jtruction during Borne period of its life, and during Borne 
;i or occasional year, otherwise, on the principl "met- 

rical increase, its numbers would quickly become so inordinately 
■ that no country could support the product. Hence, as more 
individuals are produced than can possibly survive, there must 
in ev< ry case be a Btruggle for exis i tice, either one individual with 
of the same species, or with the individuals of distinct 
p with the physical conditions of life. It is the doctrine 
of Malihus applied with manifold force to the whole animal ami 
table kingdoms; for in this case there can he no artificial in- 
crease of food, ami no prudential restraint from marriage. Al- 
though some species may he now increasing, more or less rapidly, 
in numbers, all can not do so, for the world would not hold them. 
"'There i< n<> exception to the rule that every organic being 
naturally increases at so high a rate, that, if not destroyed, the 
earth would soon h.- covered by the progeny of a single pair. 
Even Blow-breeding man has doubled in twenty-five years, and at 
this rate, in less than a thousand years, there would literally net 
he standing-room for his progeny." l 

Competition in nature, then, is a struggle for existence — a 
process whereby continually increasing numbers of individuals 
contend with one another for the available means of sub- 
A.s observed in human society, however, competition is 
-ted in many different modes and degrees. It i< only in 
communil ich have not a tra( overnment that it is 

unrestricted. When each individual is aide to act upon the 
impulse of the moment, unrestrained by any legal regulation, 
competition is unrestricted. Such a condition obtains among 
animal-, and perhaps among such communities as those of the 
of Africa. It is the only pure individualism, and in- 
volve- the maximum legal liberty. As soon as legal restraint 
upon the acts of individuals in the interest of society is imp 
pure individualism is al an end and anti-individualism begins. 
term socialism ; atly adapted to stand for that which 

ed to individualism, hut ;i< it happens, this term has al- 
ii confined to certain relatively high degrees ^>f anti- 
alism, and hence is no! available for this purpose. It is 

i ( >i igin of Bpeciee ; I !hap, 3, 






COMPETITION d 

no part of my object to discuss the various forms of restricted 
competition which human society in its various stages presents, 
nor to trace how, by the slow change of custom and the sub- 
stitution of one dogma for another, the present system of com- 
petition has been evolved. Karl Marx has already treated this 
subject historically with great thoroughness. The particular 
stage at present attained by European countries and America 
has been appropriately called the capitalistic system. It is to 
the effect upon happiness of competition as observed under the 
capitalistic system that I wish to direct discussion. Its politi- 
cal philosophy is embodied principally in the laissez faire school 
of economics already referred to. 

Capital is defined as weaLth devoted to purposes of production. 
It is generally divided into two classes — circulating and -fixed 
capital. Mill thus discusses them: 

" Of the capital engaged in tire production of any commodity, 
there is a part, which, after being once used, exists no longer as 
capital; is no longer capable of rendering service to production, 
or at least not the same service, nor to the same sort of production. 
Such, for example, is the portion of capital which consists of 
materials. The tallow and alkali of which soap is made, once 
used in the manufacture, are destroyed as alkali and tallow; and 
cannot be employed any further in the soap manufacture, though 
in their altered condition, as soap, they are capable of being used 
as a material or an instrument in other branches of manufacture. 
In the same division must be placed the portion of capital which 
is paid as the wages, or consumed as the subsistence of labourers. 
That part of the capital of a cotton-spinner which he pays away to 
his workpeople, once so paid, exists no longer as his capital, or as 
a cottonspinner's capital : such portion of it as the workmen con- 
sume, no longer exists as capital at all : even if they save any part, 
it may now be more properly regarded as a fresh capital, the result 
of a second act of accumulation. Capital which in this manner 
fulfils the whole of its office in the production in which it is en- 
gaged, by a single use, is called Circulating Capital. The term, 
which is not very appropriate, is derived from the circumstance, 
that this portion of capital requires to be constantly renewed by 
the sale of the finished product, and when renewed is perpetually 
parted with in buying materials and paying wages; so that it does 
its work, not by being kept, but by changing hands, 

" Another large portion of capital, however, consists in instru- 
ments of production, of a more or less permanent character; which 
produce their effect not by being parted with, but by being kept; 
and the efficacy of which is not exhausted by a single use. To this 
class belong buildings, machinery, and all or most things known 



10 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

by the name of implements or tools. The durability of some of 
these is considerable, and their function as productive instruments 
is prolonged through many repetitions of the productive operation. 
In this class must likewise be included capital Bunk (as th< 

in permanent improvements of land. Bo also the 
capital expended once for all, in the commencement of an under- 
taking, to prepare the way for subsequent operations: the ex] 

mine, for example: of cutting canals, of making roads 
or docks. Other examples might be added, but these are sufficient. 

Capital winch exists in any of these durable shapes, and the return 

to which is spread over a period of corresponding duration, is called 
Fixed Capital:' 1 

The owner of capital is called a capitalist. The manipulator 
or localizer of capital, or he who employ? it for productive pur- 
3, is called a laborer. Now the distinguishing characteristic 
of the capitalistic Bystem is that the capital of a community is 
not owned by those who employ it. Hence arises the familiar 
system whereby one man or set of men induce other men 
to manipulate or localize their capital for them; the wealth re- 
ceived in exchange for the result of said manipulation or 
localization being divided between capitalist and laborer. The 
part received by the capitalist is called pro/if; that received by 
the Laborer is called wages or salary. In other words, the 
capitalist employ- the Laborer and the laborer employs the 
capital: the resull is profit for the capitalist, and wages lor the 
Laborer — both resulting from the employment of capital by 
Labor. Of course, in any stage of capitalism hut the most 
primitive there are many kinds of labor which do not involve 
the actual handling of the material of production. The 
machinery of modern production is bo complex that in addition 
to the Laborers who actually manipulate the material-, or 
localize the product-, there art 1 many other laborers, such as 
managers, clerk-, salesmen, office boys, watchmen, etc.. all having 
their part in the mechanism of production. Sometimes capital- 
lake pari themselves in the business of production, acting 
usually in the capacity of managers, directing the activiti 
their employees. In tin- case, of course, they are both capital- 
ists and Laborers, and their recompense, therefore, is partly 
- and partly profit. Frequently, however, no distinction is 
made between them, and hence the general implication that all 
capitalists perform productive functions because Borne of them 
do. We -hall confine the term profit to dividends, rent, and in- 

i Political Economy j Book I. Chap. G. 



COMPETITION 11 

terest, or receipts properly creditable to one or the other class; 
that is, profit is what the capitalist receives for the use of his 
capital. The land-holder is a capitalist by virtue of his title to 
the most universally essential kind of fixed capital, viz., land. 
The recompense received by small merchants, farmers, black- 
smiths, etc. is, according to this definition, rather wages than 
profits. Their profits so-called are in reality due only in small 
part to their possession of capital, most of it being recompense 
for the labor performed by them. This is shown by the fact that 
they would receive but a very small part of their actual recom- 
pense, did they simply sell the use of their capital. 

The opposition of interest which competition under the 
capitalistic system brings about is of four classes: (1) The op- 
position between capitalists and their competitors, whereby 
profits tend to a minimum: (2) The opposition between laborers 
and their competitors, whereby wages tend to a minimum, and 
duration of labor to a maximum: (3) The opposition between 
buyer and seller, the one striving to decrease, the other to in- 
crease the price of commodities: (4) The opposition between 
capitalists and laborers, the one striving to increase profit at the 
expense of wages, the other striving to increase wages at the 
expense of profit. The fourth class of opposition is but a 
special case of the third ; the capitalist being the buyer and the 
laborer the seller of labor. 

This opposition of interest between the individuals and 
classes of a community is, according to the prevailing school of 
economy, a source of benefit; and in theory most men appear 
to agree with this view. In practice, however, all classes seek 
to avoid it. Everyone is willing that others should meet com- 
petition but no one likes to meet it himself, and with the process 
of time and increase of intelligence, men have found a way to 
avoid certain classes of competition. Thus by combination be- 
tween capitalists, private monopolies are formed and the first 
class of opposing interests is abolished. By similar combina- 
tions between laborers into labor unions, or private labor mo- 
nopolies, the second class of opposing interests is abolished. To 
abolish the third and fourth classes of competitive opposition, 
great efforts have been expended, but so far without much 
success. A brief discussion of the fourth class will show why. 

The opposed interest of the buyer and seller of labor con- 
stitutes the so-called labor problem of the present day. To solve 
it one or both of two objects must be attained. Either (1) A 
way must be found whereby the relation of profits and wages may 



12 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

ade such that neither can be increased by a d< A the 

other: or (2) A way musl be Found of making men aa much in- 
terested in the happiness of their fellow men as they are in their 
own. The firsl requires an alteration in the wa m — the 

second an alteration in human nature 1 . Attempts to solve the 
problem by both methods have been made. 

The attainment of the first object has been sought by the ex- 
ut of profit-sharing in various forms, including the issue of 
dividend-bearing stock to employees. This expedient has met 
with some bucccss, but wherever Labor is organized its buco 
likely to be inversely proportional to the intelligence of the labor- 
ers, for the increase in recompense from profit-sharing is neces- 
sarily BO slight as compared with that to ho derived from even a 
small percentage increase of wages, that the latter method of 
bettering their condition will be preferred by laborers who under- 
stand their own interest; since the resulting loss in their divi- 
dends cannot be nearly equivalent to the gain in their wages. It 
is obvious that it would be perfectly possible to distribute all 
profit as wages. Profit, therefore, may be regarded as a fund 
withdrawn from wages. To restore a fraction of what lias al- 
ready been withdrawn, clearly cannot compensate for the original 
withdrawal. So long as a business is making any profit at all 
there is a prospect of increasing wages at its expense, and the 
laborers, if tin 1 means are available, will attempt to do so. 
Whether this attempt is just or not will depend, of course, upon 
its effect upon happiness, a subject to which we shall presently 
revert. Where labor is not organized, profit-sharing will doubt- 
less tend to harmonize the interests of capitalist and laborer; 
but unfortunately it is usually fear of the power of labor or- 
ganization which has prompted capitalists to share their profits 
with their employees — hence, where labor is unorganized, profit- 
sharing is net generally a popular policy among capitalists. 

The attainment of the second object has been Bought by the 
establishmenl of boards of conciliation and arbitration, or other 
mean- of inducing the parlies to a labor controversy to consider 
' ist claims of their opponents. The difficulty is that in the 
absence of any definition of justice, no one can agree upon what 
constitutes a jusl claim. Bence it must be decided by some 
purely arbitrary standard, generally founded upon prevailing 
customs. If men were unselfish, and each party to the oon- 
psy were as much concerned in the happiness of the other as 
in bis own, the strife between capitalist and laborer could be 
ended with little difficulty. Hence those who maintain that the 



COMPETITION 13 

Golden Bule, if applied, would solve the labor problem are 
correct. But it is equally true and equally pertinent that if 
human beings could live on a diet of stones it would solve the 
problem of feeding the poor. If men would apply the Golden 
Bule, most problems which plague humanity would be solved. 
The question is: how are you to induce them to apply it? 
Certainly not by simply telling them to do so. Had that method 
been effectual the end would have been accomplished long ago. 

But if those who maintain the beneficence of competition are 
correct, the contention and competition of capitalist and laborer 
for an increased share in the product to be divided between 
them is not a harm, but a benefit; the labor problem is no 
problem at all. Its solution would be a misfortune — since this 
constant strife is but one manifestation of wholesome competi- 
tion, and of that beneficent institution communities cannot have 
too much. To abolish the labor problem would be a blow at 
competition, of course, and hence would be harmful, just as trusts 
and labor unions are harmful according to the same school of 
economy. 

Now, there are reasons to believe that while human nature 
remains as it is, a real solution of the labor problem is incom- 
patible with the capitalistic system. Competition is its cause, 
and it can be cured only by abolishing its cause. Should some 
palliative come to be mistaken for a cure, I believe it would be 
a public misfortune. The reasons for this belief will appear in 
the discussion which follows, in which the relation of capitalistic 
competition to happiness will be examined. The way to discover 
the effect of competition upon happiness is to discover its effect 
upon the elements of happiness separately. To attempt to ascer- 
tain its total effect in any other way would but lead to the con- 
fusion and inconclusiveness so familiar in the current dis- 
cussions of this all-important question, wherein the effort is 
made to evaluate the complex effect of competition without any 
analysis of each effect separately. In other words, if competi- 
tion is beneficial to society, it is beneficial by virtue of its effect 
upon one or more of the elements of happiness. Let us then 
examine its effect upon each of the elements of happiness, in 
order that we may, if possible, locate the point at which its 
beneficence enters. 

First : What is the effect of competition on the first element of 
happiness? Does it tend to improve the quality of human 
beings ? Does it tend to the development of a high level of in- 
tellect and character ? If it does, it must be through some effect 



14 Till: POLITICS OF TTILITY 

upon inheritance, or education, or both, since the qualities of 
human individual- an- functions of these factors and of no 
others. First, then. Let us consider inheritam 

A- acquired characters are not inherited the only mode in 
which competition can affect the inheritance of the race is 
through selection. Hoe- competition tend to cause those who 
possess intelligence, altruism, and will, in marked degree, to 
hived faster than those who possess them in less marked d 
Does competition tend to improve the human race by its efi 
upon breeding? It is a familiar claim that competition does 
tend thus to improve the human breed through the effect of 
natural selection or the survival of the fittest. Let us then 
examine this claim. On page 8 we have quoted Darwin's 

scription of competition in nature, or the struggle of in- 
dividuals with one another for the means of suh>istenco. Now, 
members of all species of organisms are subject to variation — 
no two individuals are exactly alike. Moreover, variations are 
transmissible by inheritance. On these simple facts Darwin 
founded his famous induction of natural selection thus: 

" How will the struggle for existence, briefly discussed in the 
last chapter, act in regard to variation? Can the principle of 
selection which we have seen is so potent in the hands of man, 
apply under nature? I think we shall see that it can act most 

ciently. Let the endless number of slight variations and in- 
dividual differences occurring in our domestic productions, and 
in a lesser degree, in those under nature be borne in mind; as well 
lie strength of the hereditary tendency. Under domestication, 
it may truly be said that the whole organization becomes in some 
derive plastic. But the variability which we almost universally 
meet with in our domestic productions is not directly produced, 
Hooker and A -a Gray have well remarked, by man; he can 
neither originate varieties nor prevent their occurrence; he can 
only preserve and accumulate such as do occur. Unintentionally 
he exposes organic beings to new and changing conditions of life, 
and variability ensues; but similar changes of conditions might 
mid do <»eeur under nature. Let it also be borne in mind how 
infinitely complex and close-fitting are the mutual relations of all 
organic beings to each other and to their physical conditions of 
life; and consequently what infinitely varied diversities of struc- 
ture might be of use to each being under changing conditions of 
lite. Can it then be thought improbable, seeing that variati< 
useful to man have undoubtedly occurred, that other variations 
useful in some way to each being in the great, and complex battle 
of lite Bhould occur in the course of many successive generations! 
I f such do occur, can we doubt (remembering that many more indi- 



COMPETITION 15 

viduals are born than can possibly survive) that individuals having 
any advantage, however slight, over others, would have the best 
chance of surviving and procreating their kind? On the other 
hand, we may feel sure that any variation in the least degree in- 
jurious would be rigidly destroyed. This preservation of favorable 
individual differences and variations, and the destruction of those 
which are injurious, I have called Natural Selection, or the Sur- 
vival of the Fittest/ 7 x 

Thus nature, by always producing many more of a species 
than can survive to propagate, and marking those for death who 
are least fitted for life, leaves those to propagate who are best 
fitted, and hence only a few of the best adapted individuals 
survive to perpetuate the species out of the vast number supplied 
by each generation. That is to say, nature selects a few from 
a great many as breeders of the species, and as these few are 
selected because of certain characteristics which distinguish them 
as best fitted to survive, these characteristics tend to become 
fixed, by inheritance, in the species. Competition, it is to be 
observed, is a necessary factor in this process, and Darwin calls 
attention to the fact that it is keenest between organisms which 
are closely related. He says : 

" As the species of the same genus usually have, though by no 
means invariably, much similarity in habits and constitution, and 
always in structure, the struggle will generally be more severe 
between them, if they come into competition with each other, than 
between the species of distinct genera." 2 

From this it appears that the struggle for existence between 
individuals of the same species must be very keen indeed. Now, 
among primitive men the process of competition is essentially 
similar to that among organisms in general; but in civilized 
society it assumes a new form. The contention between in- 
dividuals is one, not for the means of subsistence alone, but for 
the means of happiness. The essential feature of the process is, 
how r ever, preserved — it is a contention — the gain of one in- 
dividual is the loss of another, the success of one implies the 
failure of others, and the greater the success of one, the greater 
the failure of others. 

It will be observed that Darwin employs the word " useful " 
in describing the characters which tend to be preserved by the 

i Origin of Species ; Chap. 4. 
2 Ibid, 



16 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

process of natural selection. Does lie express by that word the 
same meaning which we have agreed to express by it? If so, 

then we can see at least one beneficent result of competition, for 
if through the straggle for existence useful characters tend to 
be more and more preserved and perpetuated in organisms, then 
competition must — at least in effecting tin's result — be a use- 
ful process. If the "fittest" characters mean the "most use- 
ful w characters, then certainly a process which involves the 
survival of the fittest will be a beneficent one. We should then 
be justified in accepting the reasoning of so many modern 
writers who are fond of dwelling on the innate beneficence of 
evolution as a natural process. These writers tell us that the 
characters which are fittest must be valuable, and a valuable 
character is, of course, beneficial. This is very much like the 
reasoning employed by physicians of the time of Paracelsus, 
when the science of medicine was about in the stage in which 
the science of politics is now. They reasoned like this: " That 
which is valuable is valuable as a cure." " Diamonds, gold, and 
frankincense are valuable." "Therefore, diamonds, gold, and 
frankincense, will be curative." Acting upon this ratiocinative 
process they prescribed for their patients various elaborate 
mixtures of pulverized jewels, precious metals, and rare oils 
and spices. Specimens of such prescriptions are still pre- 
served in ancient works on medicine. When it occurred to these 
practitioners that gold and jewels were valuable, they neglected 
to ask themselves the question: Valuable for what? Similarly 
authors who write of the value of individuals, or character- 
istics thereof, which are fit, neglect to ask themselves: Fit for 
what? Natural selection produces individuals who are fit to 
live under conditions of competition. It is a process of the sur- 
vival of the fittest to survive. But individuals, or individual 
characteristics are useful in the degree in which they tend to 
increase the total happiness. Those, however, who are fittest to 
survive are not necessarily those fittest to increase the total 
happiness, any more than things of a high financial value are 
necessarily of a high curative value, A prior!, they are as 
likely to be the reverse. Thus we see that the human mind 
preserves the same kind of deviation from common sense 
whether in the stage of medical or political quackery. Tn fact, 
Darwin does not employ the word " useful " in the meaning in 
which we employ it. Useful as a means of survival does not 
mean useful as a means of happiness, because survival does not 
necessarily imply happiness. "But," it may be replied, "the 



COMPETITION 17 

characters which have enabled individuals to live are certainly 
useful, since without life there can be no happiness, and it is 
these characters which must be possessed by those who survive." 
Without dwelling upon the fact that competition does not 
create these characters, but only determines their perpetuation 
when created, we may point out that although life is a 
necessary, it is by no means a sufficient condition of happiness. 
Any particular life interval to be useful as an end must reveal a 
surplus of happiness; otherwise, oblivion or no life at all is 
preferable (p. 127). 1 We may point out also that life supplies 
likewise a necessary condition of unhappiness, and we shall 
presently point out that we have but to add competition, to 
obtain the sufficient conditions as well. 

It is clear that the reasoning on this subject, so far as reason 
has been applied to it at all, fails for the same reason that most 
sociological and political reasoning fails. Men are not clear in 
their own minds as to the nature of usefulness — they do not 
know just what it is that individuals, or those aggregates of in- 
dividuals called nations, are, or should be, trying to attain ; hence 
failure in the attempt to specify the means of attaining it. In 
the case under discussion the end of nature is continually con- 
founded with the end of man. These ends are totally different. 
Hence we should expect to find that the means of attaining them 
are different, and this is what we do find. Nature, so far as the 
process of natural selection reveals her design, (and we here 
speak of design figuratively, since there is no evidence of de- 
liberate intent) aims to adapt organisms more and more com- 
pletely to their environment — to make it increasingly difficult 
for related varieties to arise which are better adapted — the test 
of their degree of adaptation being their ability to survive in 
competition. So far as I am aware, non-sentient nature em- 
ploys pleasure and pain as means, but never seeks them as ends. 
Pain, or the expectation of pain, warns animals of danger to 
their lives and prompts them to seek food when hungry, and 
hence is a " useful " means of insuring the survival of the 
individual. Pleasure, or the anticipation of pleasure, prompts 
them to consume their food when found, and to seek mates for 
the purpose of breeding — hence pleasure is a " useful " means 
of insuring the survival of the individual and of the race. 
But neither pleasure nor pain are of the slightest value to 
nature as ends — mere survival and perpetuation is all she 

i Of The Economy of Happiness, 

% 



18 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

The aim of man, on the other hand, is, or should be, the 
maximum output of happiness. With ends so distinci it is in- 
evitable thai til* 1 menus to be adopted to attain them must be 
distinct If all we Beek is survival, nature's methods wi 
our purpose, but it' we seek happiness, we must devise very dif- 
ferent ones. 

I now propose to show that were modern competitive ideals 
realized, the process of the survival of the fittest to survive would 
lend to deteriorate, rather than to improve, the human hived — 
to destroy, rather than to develop, intelligence and character. In 
Chapter 6 1 notice has been taken of several influences thus 
tending to race deterioration. A more potent influence still, 
threatens, due directly to competition. This influence has little 
if any effect upon adjustability since that quality is developable 
solely, or at least principally, through education; neither is it 
materially concerned with health; but upon the other determi- 
nants of efficiency of conversion its effects must of necessity be 
marked. 

It is universally observed and universally conceded that com- 
petition results in widespread poverty. Now, the effort of the 
enlightened communities of to-day is to make competition fair, 
i. o., to make each individual's success in the world depend upon 
his own intrinsic qualities, and not upon accidents of birth or 
station. Success in this effort to give every individual a fair 
chance means that those whose intrinsic qualities are not such as 
to make them succeed in competition will tend more and more, 
through failure, to sink into the poorer, less educated and l< ss 
fortunate class, while those whose qualities are such as to lead to 
success will tend to become prosperous and wealthy. Now, what 
are the intrinsic qualities which, on the average, tend to increase 
a man's chance of success in the modern struggle for wealth 

! opportunity? They are (1) Intelligence, (?) Will, and 
(3) Egotism. The third quality is seldom seriously lacking in 
any individual — hence it is not likely to be a critical factor, 
Bui if these are the qualities which tend to success, those which 
tend to failure must be (1) Unintelligence, (2) Lack of will, 
and (3) Altruism; and it is these, particularly the first two, 
which — so far as competition determines their distribution — 
will tend to become the characteristics of the poorer classi 
Bui the poorer and less educated classes — as all students of 
Bociology admit — are the very ones which breed the fastest — ■ 

i of The Economy <»f Bappin< 



COMPETITION 19 

they are the classes which contribute the greater number of in- 
dividuals to each succeeding generation. As men and women 
become prosperous they breed more slowly. Hence if we divide 
society into a prosperous slow-breeding, and a less prosperous 
fast-breeding class, and by giving all men a fair chance, tend 
to locate the intelligent and potent in the first class, and the 
unintelligent and impotent in the second, race deterioration is 
inevitable, since each generation will be recruited in much 
greater degree from the second class than from the first. As 
results prove, under competitive conditions, the members of the 
second class are those best fitted to survive, and this despite theii 
higher death rate — but they are not those best fitted to pro- 
duce a happy communiy. Hence the competitive process of the 
survival of the fittest to survive results in the survival of the 
unfittest to produce happiness. We may call this the law of the 
survival of the incompetent. If the process of race deterioration 
implied by this law were permitted to proceed indefinitely, the 
human breed would rapidly retrograde toward the simian level, 
for the effects of such a process are cumulative or accelerative, 
and in accelerative processes the most pronounced effects are 
only a matter of time. This process has little effect upon 
tastes or needs, or upon altruism, and, indeed, such effect as it 
has upon the latter quality is good rather than bad. In times 
past the race has been protected from the evil effects described, by 
the universal prevalence of poverty and poor education. The 
intelligent and the unintelligent, the strong and the weak-willed 
have, on the average, been kept in the poorer, fast-breeding 
class; only a favored few, as often incompetents as not, finding 
their way into the opulent, aristocratic, slow-breeding class. 
Thus the very universality of poverty in the past, and the 
presence in the poorer classes of an even quota of the intelligent 
and potent has prevented this source of race deterioration. It 
is only in recent times, with the advent of universal education 
and the opening of an approach to equal opportunity, that the 
effect we have pointed out tends to come into operation. To 
neutralize it without abolishing equality of opportunity we 
must abolish poverty, or else base the division into slow and fast 
breeding classes upon some other distinction than that between 
the competent and the incompetent. So far as I am aware, no 
practical method of doing this has as yet been suggested. 
Exhortation will not serve the end. Eeference to race-suicide 
will not make any class in the community increase or decrease 
its rate of breeding. Until some other method is suggested, we 



20 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

must regard the abolition of poverty itself as the only just 
remedy for this soui - jeneracy. This may be un- 

attainable, but its attainment is at Least worth attempting, and 
if nol attainable, then the deterioration of the race by the - 
tion of the incompetenl is probably destine*] to proceed, unless 
by oatural or artificial means a thoroughgoing inequality of op- 
portunity is established. Developed capitalism in rtroys 

equality of opportunity, as is obvious at the present day. Eence 

i eracy is scarcely a danger any loi 
bui by thus banishing the menace of degeneracy, capitalism will 
3troyed the best ideal of the modern competitive Bystem 

— the ideal of equal opportunity. No lover of justice can be 

Bed with such a solution of the dilemma, yet if poverty. 
cannol be abolished there is no other. 

Little need he said of the effect on public education of com- 
petition since even by the laissez faire theorists it is acknowl- 
; that nothing is to be hoped for from leaving the education 
of the people to the unguided beneficence of nature. They are. 
to be sure, convinced thai a- regards most factor- in the welfare 
of Bociety, nature is beneficent and should be "let alone" to 
work out its own ends, hut for some unexplained reason benefi- 
appears to desert the operation^ i)\' nature in the domain 
of education, and hence society, by deliberate effort, must pro- 
vide for it. Competition, of course, trains men in many things 

— in particular it teaches them how to iret the best of their 
fellows; developing quickness of intellect to he sure, hut at the 
same time fostering dishonesty, suspicion, and other egotistic 
trait-. There is no community in which such characteristics are 
not sufficiently developed. As no one proposes to return to the 
Bystem of education provided by nature, however, we need not 
discuss the subject. It is in operation wherever barbarism 

ails. 
The system of public schools, which, in opposition to the 
theory of laissez faire, all enlightened states have adopted, is 
one of the most satisfactory efforts of modern society toward 
wn betterment. We have already pointed out some of the 
ts of that Bystem — due to the Belf-perpetuating pow< 
dogma. These defects and many others, however, may he in 
time eliminated by the deliberate application o( the common 
sense of the community — whereas if left to themselves — or to 
natur< — there would belittle prospect of improvement. 

8< "i"l : A.8 the life of man Bhould be divided between pro- 
duction and consumption, his desires should be adapted to both 



COMPETITION 21 

these classes of acts and, other things being equal, the system 
which breeds the most satisfaction in work and in recreation will 
be the best one. 

In promoting adjustability as it affects production, the capital- 
istic system has no advantages. It does not tend to reconcile 
men to excessive labor or to create in them a taste for it. It 
makes neither retrospection nor anticipation pleasing. In the 
degree in which it discourages hope and tames aspiration it is 
successful in producing resignation — a resignation too fre- 
quently cynical. So far as this adapts the laborer's desires to 
inevitable conditions it augments the efficiency of conversion. 
Where unpleasant conditions are inevitable it is better to be 
.resigned than not resigned, but where they are not inevitable, 
resignation is bad, since it inhibits the search for, and applica- 
tion of, remedies. One of the commonest and bitterest criticisms 
of those who, through agitation, seek a happier condition for 
mankind is that they make men dissatisfied with their lot in 
life. Such criticism is quite unreasonable. With the knowl- 
edge at present available the unpleasant conditions of produc- 
tion which prevail are not inevitable ; hence it is not well that 
the laborer should be satisfied with his non-self-supporting life. 
If he is satisfied, he should be made unsatisfied. To sleep 
well at night is a poor goal for ambition. Those who die 
sleep better. A nation w T hose object is the maximum output of 
happiness has no place in its economy for individuals who are 
" satisfied " to be unhappy, any more than an engineer whose 
object is the maximum generation of steam has a place for 
boilers which are " satisfied " to consume coal without produc- 
ing steam. What useful end is to be subserved if the forests are 
cleared from the wilderness only to be replaced by a plantation 
of human vegetables ? 

The effect of competition on adjustability as it affects con- 
sumption cannot be deemed beneficial. The dire consequences 
of failure in the struggle for existence fill men's minds with 
misgiving, even when they are prosperous, haunting the hours 
of relaxation of those engaged in the fierce struggle to avoid 
them. The desire for competence and independence is the hope 
of the many — it is the realization of the few ; and such a hope, 
forever deferred, and lapsing into hopelessness rather than res- 
ignation as time goes on, maketh sick the heart of the multi- 
tude. The consumption of a few in the zone of overconsump- 
tion involves the consumption of the many in the zone of under- 
consumption, and the same system which makes permanent the 






THE Politics OF UTILITY 



first makes the second permanent also. That which secures to 
wealthy their wealth, secures their poverty to the poor. It 

is plenty of room a1 the top and to point 
to isolated examples of men who have made their way there — 
often by devious methods. There is just as much room at the 
bottom, and what is more to the point, competition insures that 
it shall be occupied. It is not the desires of the few at the top, 
but that of the many who are far from the top which mus 
fulfilled if the happiness output of the community is to be pos- 
itive. The necessity which competition imposes of becoming 
independent by the acquisition of wealth or suffer ceaseless 
Btruggle, implants in men's minds a fierce desire for money, and 
they ceaselessly strive to attain it. They usually fail, but 
! ;er they fail or succeed in their search for money, they lose 
in their search for happiness, for win or lose they are never 
satisfied. This money-lust, which is hut a form of avari 
becoming the besetting sin of modern life. It is a taste neither 
simple nor adaptable and it seems to preclude variety. It is 
hard to satiate, and satiable only at the expense of others, for 
under competition there are few ways of acquiring wealth ex- 
cept by attaining a position in which we are enabled to share 
in what labor produces without sharing in the lahor, or sharing 
in it in an insignificant decree. To accomplish this is what the 
world calls Buccess, and the great success of one means the great 
failure of many. Wealth does not fall from the moon. TTenoo 
if there are those in the community who can avail themselves 
of more lahor than they perform, it can only be because in the 
same community there are those who can avail themselvi 
less ' v perform. The working classes feel this, though 

by the v.- g of the prevailing morality it is concealed from 

their understanding. They feel convinced that there is some- 
thing wrong in Buch inequality, though they cannot answer the 
current sophistries which prove that as it originates in inalien- 
able rights it must be right — it is legal and hence it is just. 
This tend- to breed in the minds of the poor envy, or at least 
suspicion, and the response of the rich is distrust. Such qual- 
ities do not promote a high efficiency of conversion, and the 
alienation of cla wever produced, is evidence of an un- 

omic attitude of mind. 
Perhaps nothing illustrates hotter how uneconomic a taste 
money-lusi is than its failure to give happiness, even to those 
who have attained wealth beyond the dreams of avarice, nor is 
there any better illustration of the popular confusion regarding 



COMPETITION 23 

the goal of society than the frequent citation of this failure to 
justify, instead of to condemn, the system which produces it. 
When it is pointed out that the present system breeds misery 
among the poor, there are those who appear to think that the 
criticism loses its force because it may be shown that it breeds 
misery among the rich also. They tell us that wealth only 
leads to anxiety and care — that the capitalist carries a heavier 
burden than the laborer — that despite his riches he cannot be 
happy, for the cares of wealth are more irksome than the pri- 
vations of poverty; such is the law of compensation. Who has 
not heard this strange plea advanced as evidence of the inherent 
justice of the prevailing condition of things ? Yet if it be true, 
then is the present system doubly damned. If those whose rate 
of consumption is too high are as unhappy as those whose rate 
is too low it but accentuates the injustice of the prevailing 
unequal distribution. It is unfair to both parties and only 
emphasizes the need of equal distribution. The only possible 
benefit of a high rate of consumption is the happiness it may 
yield, and yet we are told that it fails even in this. This is 
strange justification. Misery cannot compensate for misery. 
Only happiness can compensate for misery, as every man can 
learn from a simple inspection of his own mind. Could it be 
shown that, under the present system, the happiness of the rich 
was so great as to more than compensate for the unhappiness of 
the poor, it might afford justification of the system, but if, in 
spite of their high rate of consumption, the rich are not happy, 
it but emphasizes how ill adapted is the competitive system to 
the requirements of human nature. 

It is unnecessary here to emphasize the poor economy of con- 
version involved in luxurious tastes. The evils of excessive lux- 
ury are a familiar subject of discussion. While such evils may 
not be confined to the competitive system, they are inseparable 
from any condition involving great inequality in the distribu- 
tion of wealth, for, as was long since remarked, it is human 
nature that increase of appetite should grow by what it feeds 
on. Hence they are inseparable from the competitive system. 
Competition, indeed, cannot be credited with any tendency to 
promote adjustability. Its inevitable separation of society into 
classes has the contrary effect, for it breeds desires in all classes 
which it cannot satisfy. 

The effect of competition upon the health of a community is 
acknowledged to be bad. The strain, anxiety, and uncer- 
tainty of life wears out the nervous system, and poisons many, 



24 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

en of the few, leisure hours vouchsafed to the average man. 
The capitalist is, it' anything, worse off than the laborer in this 
particular, and frequently trades health for wealth — a pooT 
bargain for a business man, since it sacrifice- the greater value 

obtain the l< 

Third: It is obvious that the natural resources of the earth 
cannol be increased by the acts of man, although their accessi- 
bility can. Resources created by man are not natural, but arti- 
ficial. But, though natural resources cannot be increased by 
man they may easily be diminished. The effect of competition 
upon utility in diminishing them we may estimate more readily 
after a consideration of its effect upon the efficiency of con- 
sumption and upon population has been examined, since it is 
upon these Factors that it depends. "We shall therefore defer 
iission of this element to page 51. 

Fourth: Passing to the effect of competition on the employ- 
ment of the non-sentient factor — of machinery — in produc- 
tion, we at once encounter that which most economists agree is 
the strongest claim of capitalism to beneficence. The develop- 
ment of the wage system under competition has led to produc- 
tion on a large scale. Huge factories have displaced -the small 
work-hop of other days, and in every variety of manipulation 
and localization the division of labor has adapted modes of pro- 
duction to the introduction of machinery. Now under compe- 
tition, other things being equal, that individual, firm, or cor- 
poration will succeed in highest degree — will make the 
greatest profits — which can produce most cheaply; hence those 
who receive the profits will be stimulated to introduce labor- 
saving machinery into their operations, because they may there- 
by dispense with the wages of laborers, since a machine which 
will do the work of ten men when operated by one, will obvi- 
ously dispense with nine men. Thus production is cheapened, 
not directly by dispensing with labor, but by dispensing with 
laborers employed in a given operation, and liberating their labor 

that it may be employed in other operations. The stimulus 
to this mode of increasing the efficiency of production is justly 
represented by economists as a very effectual one. since the desire 
for wealth in all men i< strong, and is not less strong among 
capitalists than among other classes of the community. Hen< 
if the reward of capitalists, whether laboring or non-laboring, is 
made a direct function o\' their success in introducing machinery 
into production, their zeal and ingenuity will he assiduously di- 



COMPETITION 25 

rected to that end. The opinions of economists on this point are 
well represented in the words of Mill, who says : 

" We have observed that, as a general rule, the business of life 
is better performed when those who have an immediate interest 
in it are left to take their own course, uncontrolled either by the 
mandate of the law or by the meddling of any public functionary. 
The person, or some of the persons, who do the work, are likely 
to be better judges than the government of the means of attaining 
the particular end at which they aim. Were we to suppose, what 
is not very probable, that the government has possessed itself of the 
best knowledge which had been acquired up to a given time by 
the persons most skilled in the occupation; even then, the indi- 
vidual agents have so much stronger and more direct an interest 
in the result, that the means are far more likely to be improved 
and perfected if left to their uncontrolled choice." 1 

Let us acknowledge that competition by this mode of increas- 
ing the efficiency of production has strong claims to approval 
and, so far as its immediate, proximate ends are concerned, 
affords an excellent means of attaining them. Nevertheless we 
must not forget that all means must be judged by their total — 
not their partial effect — in the attainment of happiness. Hence 
if it should appear that the remote effects of competition in this 
particular, neutralize, or more than neutralize, its immediate ef- 
fects, we cannot approve the system on these grounds. We shall 
presently consider some of these more remote effects. But be- 
fore leaving the present subject, it should be remarked that the 
same stimulus which is so strong in inducing capitalists to intro- 
duce labor-saving machinery into production is equally strong in 
inducing them to introduce devices designed, not to save labor, 
but to produce inferior products. This . subject is so familiar 
to everyone and has been so often treated by economists that it 
would be superfluous to dilate upon it. The innumerable adul- 
terations, impostures, and cheats that are everywhere manufac- 
tured and sold, from wooden nutmegs to watered stocks, are 
products of this stimulus to gain. The development of means 
of imposition and corruption, like that of other kinds of mechan- 
ism, accelerates as time goes on. It is but a special case of the 
progress of an art, and the man who lays the foundation of his 
success by adulterating sugar with sand, or salting a mine, 
crowns it by purchasing a legislature, or perverting public opin- 
ion through the power of the press. It is characteristic of the 

1 Political Economy; Book V, Chap. 11. 



26 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

nomists that for thia condition of things they 
• do rem'edj bui preaching. Thus Eerberi Spencer, 
pointing oul many of the.-*' products of competition, observi 

w Aa for remedy, it manifestly follows that there is none 
a purified public opinion. When thai abhorrence which society 
now shows to direct theft, is Bhown to theft of all d f in- 

directness; then will these mercantile vice- cjisappear. When not 

only the trader who adulterates or gives short measure, hut also 
the merchant wh<> overtrades, the hank-direetor who countenances 
an exaggerated report, and the railway-director who repudiates hifl 
guarantee, come to he regarded as of the same genus as the pick- 
pocket, and are treated witli like disdain; then will the morals of 
trade become what they should he. 

" We have little hope, however, that any such higher tone of 
public opinion will shortly be reached." 1 

We agree with Spencer that if we must wait for public opinion 
1o remedy this condition, the prospect is far from encouraging. 
The evil is a growing, not a diminishing, one and has vastly 
increased since Spencer wrote New form- of corruption and 
imposture develop every day. Unorganized public opinion such 
as Spencer appeals to cannot check it. and were he consistent he 
would have made no appeal to it. Why should he attempt arti- 
ficial! v to influence public opinion to condemn such evils — why 
not let things take their naturally beneficent course? Why will 
not these evils remedy themselves, like all the other ills which 
the operation of natural law incidentally develops? Why should 
the laissez faire economist appeal to unorganized, any more than 
to organized, public opinion? This is not a consistent "let 
alone w policy ; it is not evidence of faith in the doctrine of benefi- 
cent drift. 

Fifth: The effect of the competitive system upon the skill 
and interest of labor is not uniform. Those who direct are 
usually interested in the profits to be made and hence have an 
incentive to apply themselves in the business of production and 
to obtain the maximum production from others at the minimum 
wage. For the directive class of labor then, there is incentii 
application, and in a less degree to the acquisition of skill. In- 
i and application, indeed, will lead to skill even if no delib- 
erate mean- are adopted to attain it. 

To the< xecutive class of Laborers, however, there is in the com- 
petitive system bui little incentive to either interest or skill ; since 

I 'Die Morals Of Trade. 









COMPETITION 27 

normally they can derive but little advantage therefrom. It is, 
naturally, the practice of the capitalist to convert into profit any 
increase in the returns from labor which may result from an in- 
crease in the application and skill of his employees. Where labor 
is unorganized this practice is almost universal, and, indeed, 
when competition between capitalists is keen it is essential to 
the maintenance of any profit at all, for keen competition makes 
failure the price of benevolence on the part of employers. Wher- 
ever labor is organized, however, and competition in some degree 
eliminated, the incentive to application is somewhat increased, 
because organization confers the pow r er upon employees of forc- 
ing their employers to share with them the increased return 
resulting from increased application. Among some labor organ- 
izations, however, a policy is adopted which more than offsets 
this incentive — that of limitation of output — a practice of 
limiting the output per capita by mutual agreement among labor- 
ers. This policy is adopted in order to distribute opportunity 
for work more uniformly among members of the organization. 
It increases the money cost, but not necessarily the labor cost of 
commodities. It is particularly frequent where the system of 
piece-work prevails and is adopted to offset the policy of em- 
ployers of diminishing the price paid per piece as the skill and 
application of employees and the introduction of machinery 
enable the production per capita to increase. It is simply a 
method of forcing the employer to forego part of his profit for 
the benefit of his employees. The effect of the policy of limita- 
tion of output upon the efficiency of production will depend upon 
the degree to which it is carried. If carried beyond a certain 
point it will increase the labor cost as well as the money cost of 
production. Nevertheless, as we shall presently see, the effect of 
such a policy on the efficiency of consumption is, in general, so 
excellent that it more than offsets any loss resulting from dimin- 
ished efficiency of production. Such a situation appears, and is, 
an anomaly, but it is a direct result of a vaster anomaly — - the 
capitalistic system — and is one evidence of how opposed that 
system is to the interests of society. 

Another result of the absence of interest on the part of the 
wage earner in the efficiency of production is found in the in- 
numerable strikes and labor disturbances so common during the 
last generation. The immediate effect of these disturbances is 
to diminish the efficiency both of production and consumption, 
but in the aggregate, their remote effect upon the efficiency of 
consumption is good, and good in the degree in which it tends 



28 



THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 



to suspend the effects of competition. We have already discn 

essentials of the labor question, and have made evident the 
antagonism of interest which it impli 

Sixth: If there is one effect of the capitalistic system more 
generally acknowledged than another it is its effect upon the dis- 
tribution of wealth. The "prodigious inequality" of which 
Mill speaks in a previous quotation (p. 292) ] is an inequalil 
wraith ami such unequal distribution appears inseparable from 
nil varieties of the competitive Bystem, ancient and modern. 
In a new country like the Dinted States inequality in the dis- 
tribution of wealth is not nearly so marked as in Europe and 
Asia. Still, it has already become a pronounced feature of our 
civilization and is, of necessity, increasing. Tn colonial days 
there was little inequality, but from the conditions of those days 
we are departing more and more. The distribution of wealth 
among the 12,500,000 families in the United States in 1890 may 
athered from the following table, which probably embodies 
the best figures available: 

THE UNITED STATES 1S90 2 



Estates 


Number of 

Families. 


Aggregate 
Wealth. 


Average 
Wealth. 


The Wealthy Clas 

50,000 and over 

The Well-to-do CI; 

0,000 to (5,000 

The Middle CI i 

$5 000 to $500 


125,000 
1,375.000 
5.500,000 
5,500,000 


$33,000,000,000 

23,000,000,000 

8,200,000,000 

S00.000.000 


$264,000 

1G.000 

] 500 


The Poorer < {lasses 

under $500 


150 



Total 



12,500,000 



$65,000,000,000 



$ 5.200 



Ro universal is this symptom that men very generally have 

come to regard it as a sort of law of nature — an unavoidable 
and ineradicable ill — and vet it is no more universal than the 
competitive system. Because it is inseparable from that system is 
no reason for claiming that it is inseparable from any and all 
systems. Those who maintain the unavoidableness of inequality 
are fond of pointing out that, if by some extraordinary agency 

1 Of The Economy of Happir* 

aCharlea B. Spahr, "The Present Distribution of Wealth/ 1 p. 69, 



COMPETITION 29 

wealth were equally distributed to-morrow it would be but a 
few years before the old condition of inequality would again be 
attained. The significant thing about this assertion is that it is 
true. Instead, however, of seeing in its truth the condemna- 
tion of the system which produces such an anomaly, the man of 
average training can see nothing but an excuse for doing nothing 
— for letting things drift — since if a condition of equal distri- 
bution, if attained, is destined so soon to lapse again into one 
of inequality, it is scarcely worth while to attempt its attainment. 

If wealth is observed to inevitably gravitate to a condition 
of unequal distribution, it must be because something causes it 
to do so, must it not? And if this be true, it surely is worth 
while to discover the cause or causes of so unfortunate a tendency, 
since there is no more essential factor in an economic system 
than that of a distribution of wealth at least approximately 
equal. I shall not here discuss these causes in detail, but shall 
deem it sufficient to remark that if the competitive system were 
of such character that under it the acquisition of wealth by 
an individual set in operation causes which made further ac- 
quisition increasingly difficult, any great inequality in distribu- 
tion would be unknown, since accumulation in a few hands 
would be automatically checked. Instead of being of this char- 
acter, however, the competitive system is so constituted as to 
produce a contrary result. Inequality, instead of equality, of 
distribution is the condition of equilibrium. The more wealth 
an individual acquires, the more likely is he to acquire more — 
wealth breeds wealth — and hence the desiderata of a community 
tend to accumulate in the hands of but a small fraction of 
the community. The process is a maleficently accelerative one, 
and even more marked in civilized than in savage communities. 
Nature then, despite its beneficence, supplies no automatic check 
to this increasing inequality of distribution. Hence if a check 
is to be supplied, it must be supplied by man. Whether a method 
of accomplishing this desirable result consistent with the charac- 
teristics of human nature can be suggested, I shall not at this 
point in the discussion attempt to say. It is sufficient to em- 
phasize the fact that equality of distribution is vital to an eco- 
nomic system of society, and that competition supplies no means 
of attaining it; but, on the contrary, is acknowledged to be 
inconsistent with its attainment. 

Seventh: Quite as essential to sound economy as the posses- 
sion by the average member of a community of an approximately 
equal share of its wealth is adequate leisure wherein to consume 



THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

it. Under the capitalistic system, not only are wages too low 
abstraction of profit for the realization of equal 
distribution, bul the hours of labor are too long to sustain a self* 
supp< indicative ratio; not only do wages tend to a mini- 

mum bul irs of Labor tend to a maximum. The effort to 

pen production in order to increase profits is the rock on 
which tin 1 system founders. For the comprehension of this mat- 
ter a rather more critical examination of the present \ 
turn will be necessary. 

T ; ere arc two kinds of wages — nominal and real. Nominal 

- arc measured by the actual number of money units — of 
dollar- or cents — paid out as recompense to labor. Real wages 
are measured, so far as measurable, by the amount of pro- 
duction represented in the desiderata purchasable by said num- 
ber of money units. It is obvious that real wages are those 
which have a direct relation to utility. Nominal wages are 
of no consequence, since an average wage of $10.00 per hour 
would be no better than one of $ .10, if prices were a hundred 

- as high under the first system as under the second. 
Under a competitive system, both nominal and real \ 
imd to a minimum, though this is often denied. It is a 
familiar argument among economists that the tendency of 
competition under the wage system to depress wages neutral- 

itself through its effect upon the purchasing power of 
Laborer competing with Laborer and capitalist with cap- 
italist, they say, causes both nominal wages and profits to tend 
to a minimum; thus prices tend to a minimum: hut in just the 

ie that prices diminish, the purchasing power of nominal 

- increases — hence a general fall of nominal wages 

not interfere with the economy of consumption, since such a fall 
causes a corresponding fall in prices, and thus real wages remain 
as before. This argument is frequently urged in favor of the 
l f'iire doctrine of free trade, i. e., free competition between 
nation-. 

of course, economists never refer to the economy of consump- 
tion in so many words; hut it is that economy which they tacitly 
- of importance when they propound this theory of 
■ jatingeffeel of competition in depressing wages. The 
sily proven fallacious in two ways. (1) Wees 
imt fall simultaneously with wages, hut there is a considerable 
i the fad that capitalists generally try to keep their 

- high until forced by competition to lower them, and when 

: , responding by a shortening of wages. Indeed, it is 



COMPETITION 31 

this fall of prices which permits, or would permit, an indefinite 
fall of nominal wages. Laborers must, naturally, receive some 
wages; they must consume some wealth in order to live and to 
labor; hence there is a point below which their wages cannot be 
forced; this point will depend upon the purchasing power of 
wages — it will depend upon prices ; hence as prices fall, nominal 
wages can and will fall, and this fall of nominal wages will be a 
fall of real wages — since prices will not fall simultaneously. 
So long as real wages are more than sufficient to just permit the 
laborer to live and labor it is possible to lower them, and if com- 
petition is keen they will be lowered — what can prevent it? 
Certainly not competition — and if something else prevents it — 
as at present, in fact, often happens — it cannot be credited to 
competition. A general decline of nominal wages and a simul- 
taneous and proportional decline of prices would not indeed affect 
real wages ; but this is not what normally occurs. Hence a fall 
of nominal, means a fall of real wages. (2) Even if the fall of 
prices prevented a fall of real w r ages, it could not compensate for 
the decrease in the indicative ratio which competition inevitably 
effects. The pleasure derived from consumption increases with 
the rate of consumption and with its duration, but as already 
pointed out, it is not proportional to either. For example, eight 
hours of consumption at a moderate self-supporting rate cannot • 
be compensated for by one hour of consumption at a rate eight 
times as great. No degree of cheapness of products can com- 
pensate for an almost total loss of leisure such as unrestricted 
competition entails. It is of slight service to men to have com- 
modities cheap if they must spend practically all of their waking 
life in producing them. As Lubbock says : " If wealth is to be 
valued because it gives leisure, it would be a mistake to sacrifice 
leisure in the struggle for wealth." 

To these considerations, it is probable that two objections will 
be made: (1) That under the capitalistic system -unrestricted 
competition does not determine profits and w r ages, but that these 
are determined by competition and custom. (2) That even 
under unrestricted competition profits and wages are functions 
of the demand for, and supply of, capital and labor respectively, 
and do not always tend to a minimum. 

We may admit both of these propositions without invalidating 
our contention that competition is destructive of the efficiency 
of consumption. Many of the customs which limit the influ- 
ence of competition have arisen from the imperative need for 
protection against the intolerable evils of competition. This is 



32 TIIE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

rtainly the origin of trusts, labor organizations, and protective 
tariffs, all of which are restrictive of competition. If through 
its modification by certain customs competition is rendered less 
intolerable, this may be deemed a tribute to those customs, but 

rtainly not to competition. In fact, were competition not tem- 

red by custom, and custom tempered by common Bense, tin 
who so stoutly maintain its beneficence would, by the mosl super- 
ficial observation, see their error. It is because competition is, 
in our day, and particularly In our country, so much modified by 
agencies restrictive thereof that delusions regarding its benefi- 
cence prevail. We shall shortly (p. 41) bring to the reader's 
attention data from which he may judge what competition can, 
and actually doc-, accomplish when its restrictions are few and 
feeble, and the reader may then confirm for himself our conten- 
tion respecting the effect of competition on the economy of con- 
sumption. He will then discover that, left to itself, capitalism 
makes the indicative ratio depend upon the endurance of the 
workers and nothing else. Were no modifying agencies set in 
operation by common sense, that race of men who pos>esscd the 
greatest capacity for endurance would soon kill by starvation all 
others who tried to engage in labor. The Chinese, for instance, 
would, in fair and free competition, probably supplant all other 
men as laborers in a few generations, and could another suffi- 
ciently prolific race be found with greater endurance as physical 
engines than the Chinese, they in turn would supplant the 
Chinese, and the population of the earth would, after a while, 
consist of little more than a race of toiling vermin whose "fit- 
ness" to survive would be founded upon their capacity for en- 
during privation and misery. What use has Justice for such 
happiness-producing mechanism- as th< 

A- to the assertion that real wages are a function of supply 
and demand and will therefore, under competition, not tend 
to a minimum, but will rise when the demand for labor inciv, - 
or the supply decreases and will fall under contrary conditions, 
ibis may be admitted without any substantial change in our 
contention. In new countries where the supply of labor is inade- 
quate, or in occupations where the demand is very variable de- 
pending, as in agriculture, for example, on the season of the year, 
the demand for laborers may exceed the supply. Such a condi- 
tion, however, is but spasmodic and the rise of wages is transient. 
In old countries, where competition ha- long prevailed, the sup- 
ply <>f Labor practically always exceed- the demand — one of the 
normal products of the capitalistic system is a great army oi' im- 



COMPETITION 33 

employed who by their competition tend to keep wages at a 
minimum. This has been shown very clearly by Marx, and it 
needs but the slightest inspection to confirm it. New countries 
cannot remain forever new, and if the competitive system shall 
continue to prevail it is only a question of time when the whole 
earth will have reached a condition that the longer settled parts 
have already reached. Let us hope that the people of those 
countries whose labor market is not yet hopelessly overstocked 
may be delivered from their delusions before it is too late. To 
this subject we shall return. At present we desire to emphasize 
the effect of competition on the seventh element of happiness — 
the primary adjustment. 

The indicative ratio, which probably requires a value greater 
than one — that is, a consuming day of more than eight hours, 
even to make the average life self-supporting, is, by competition, 
forced to approach a minimum; thus precluding all chance of a 
self-supporting community. It is to the interest of the capital- 
ist to make the systematic working day as long as possible, since 
by that means his profit is augmented. It is idle to ignore or 
to attempt concealment of this obvious fact. Hence so long as 
his interests are consulted and his influence prevails the indica- 
tive ratio will tend to a minimum instead of to the point of maxi- 
mum efficiency. In other words, this uneconomic tendency is a 
direct result of capitalism. 

Failure to adjust the indicative ratio to productive and con- 
sumptive power in the manner specified in Chapter 7 x results in 
another source of wretched economy. I refer to the recurrent 
industrial crises or eras of " hard times " which are directly 
traceable to this failure. The introduction of labor-saving ma- 
chinery by the capitalist is for the purpose of enhancing his 
profits by saving him the wages of laborers. The laborers 
thrown out of employment by machinery increase the supply 
of labor, and by making competition keener, tend to lower the 
wages and increase the working hours of laborers in general. 
Hence, while the introduction of machinery increases the pro- 
ductive rate, it does not increase the consumptive rate, and 
what is of vital importance it tends rather to diminish than to 
increase the indicative ratio. What is the consequence ? While 
the production of commodities is greatly stimulated their con- 
sumption is not stimulated in the same degree, if at all. Hence 
commodities are not consumed as fast as they are produced and 

i Of The Economy of Happiness. 
3 



U THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

they begin to accumulate in the warehouses. After a while the 
supply exc< demand and prices begin to fall. Even this 

• stimulate consumption much because the rich are al- 
ready largely supplied; the employed poor haw such low wag 
and so little time to consume that their consumption is of ne- 
ssity lar. ative, and their consuming power small; and 

• unemployed poor are reduced to a minimum of consumption. 
Even with Tallin-- prices and no profits, however, the capitalist 
cannot afford to stop production since, where costly machinery 
is employed, the capital invested is so great and the deteriora- 
tion so rapid that to suspend operation- is ruinous and capitalists 
prefer to run even at a loss. When the market is already over- 
stocked such a policy hut makes matters worse, and the over- 
production becomes more marked. Finally suspension has to 
come; but while this tends to rectify matters by diminishing 
production, it makes them worse by diminishing consumption, 
for all the laborers thrown out of employment are reduced to 
the minimum of consumption. This still further demorali - 
the market, and other plants suspend, and consumption is -till 
further reduced. Pauperism and crime increase, more and m 
firms fail, each failing firm weakening its creditors, who fail in 
their turn — all hut the strongest go down like a row of domim 
and their employees cease to he factors in consumption. The 
whole machinery of industry is thrown out of geaT and we have 
the disconcerting spectacle of a great surplus of commoditi 
whose owners are only too desirous to soil, an army of labor 
desperately in need thereof and anxious to buy, hut unable 
work and hence unable to buy. So defectiw is the capitalistic 
mechanism that in this condition of affairs there is nothing to 
do hut wait until those still able to consume have depleted the 
accumulated stocks and increased the demand for commodities. 
To supply this demand plants begin again to operate, the la- 
borers therein again to consume above the minimum, the market 
gradually strengthens and finally industry is at its height again. 
Bui the growing demand at the beginning of a period of pi 
perity over-stimulates the means of supply — machinery is still 
further improved — production overtakes consumption again, 
and again comes a crisis due to overproduction, or what is a 
more appropriate term, to underconsumption; since it is be- 
cause production is stimulated while consumption is not. or not 
stimulated in proportion, that these periodic depressions of busi- 
- occur. In fact, while the capitalistic system promotes effi- 
piency of production in some degree, it destroys efficiency 



Chap. XI] COMPETITION 35 

consumption by emphasizing the unequal distribution of wealth, 
which is a symptom of all competition, and by failing to increase 
the indicative ratio, thus inducing periodic panics. That these 
panics are due to the capitalistic system is shown by the fact 
that they were unknown before the growth of that system began. 
During the last century they have recurred, on the average, once 
every ten or eleven years. 

To avert crises of this character it is necessary to stimulate 
consumption in the same degree as production, but capitalism 
has no tendency to do this. Every far-sighted capitalist would be 
glad to have his fellow capitalists increase the wages and di- 
minish the hours of labor of their employees, for thereby his mar- 
ket would be improved, but he does not want to initiate such a 
policy among his own employees, since he would lose more than 
he would gain. Hence, instead of thus stimulating the market 
at home, capitalists seek to extend their markets into other 
lands, for only by so doing can they find an outlet for the com- 
modities which they produce in excess of the home demand. 
Thus arises the race for foreign markets in the effort to capture 
which industrial nations compete with one another, and that na- 
tion which oppresses its producing classes the most will — other 
things being equal — win the prize. 

Eighth: The tendency of organic beings to increase in geo- 
metric ratio, upon which Darwin founded his theory of natural 
selection through the struggle for existence, finds no exception 
in man. Under ordinary conditions of competition the propa- 
gation of human beings is determined by the same impulses and 
proceeds according to the same law as that of cats, or rabbits, 
or grasshoppers. The population of any given area tends to 
increase until it has reached equilibrium with the capacity of 
that area to support further increase of population. This law 
is as true for men as for animals and vegetables. Throughout 
the organic world, where no artificial restraint is met, the check 
to propagation is starvation. Owing to the laws of diminishing 
and dwindling returns of labor the pressure of population upon 
its means of subsistence begins to produce painful results long 
before equilibrium is actually reached. Poverty steadily in- 
creases until it is checked by death — that is, by the death rate 
becoming equal to the birth rate. All uncivilized countries which 
have been long enough settled are at or near such a point of 
equilibrium. This tendency of populations to increase faster 
than their means of subsistence is called the Law of Maltkus and 
was expressed by its alleged originator as follows : 



GO THE POLITICS OF 1TILITY 






"Throughout the animal and vegetable kingdoms Nature hag 
scattered the seeds of life abroad with the mosl profuse and liberal 
hand; bul has been comparatively sparing in the room and the 
nourishment necessary to rear them. The germs of existence con- 
tained in this earth, if they could freely develop themselves, would 
till millions of worlds in the course of a few thousand years. \< - 
sity, thai imperious, sill-pervading law of nature, restrains them 
within the prescribed bounds. The race of plants and the race of 
animals shrink under this great restrictive law; and man cannot 
by any efforts of reason escape from it. 

" In plants and irrational animals, the view of the subject is 
simple. They are all impelled by a powerful instinct to the in- 
crease of their species, and this instinct is interrupted by no doubts 
about providing for their offspring. Wherever, therefore, there is 
liberty, the power of increase is exerted, and the superabundant 
effects are repressed afterwards by want of room and nourish- 
ment. 

" The effects of this cheek on man are more complicated. Im- 
pelled to the increase 1 of his Bpecies by an equally powerful instinct, 
reason interrupts his career, and asks him whether he may not 
bring beings into the world for whom he cannot provide the 
means of support. If he attend to this natural suggestion, the 
restriction too frequently produces vice. If he hear it not, the 
human race will be constantly endeavoring to increase beyond 
the means of subsistence. But as, by that law of our nature which 
makes food necessary to the life of man, population can never 
actually increase beyond the lowest nourishment capable of sup- 
porting it. a strong check on population, from the difficulty of 
acquiring food, must be constantly in operation. This difficulty 
must fall somewhere, and must necessarily be severely felt in some 
or other of the various forms of misery, or the fear of misery, by 
a large port ion of mankind. 

"That population has this constant tendency to increase beyond 
the menus of subsistence, and that it is kept to its necessary level 
by these causes will sufficiently appear from a review of the differ- 
ates of society in which man has existed." l 

The resemblance of this quotation to that from Darwin, al- 
ready cited, is at once noticeable, and illustrates the close relation 
between competition and Malthusianism. 

The Law of Malihus, if left uninterpreted, is easily misunder- 

and its validity has often been attacked, notably by Henry 

George in his work on u Progress and Poverty." In fact, if 

understand this law to assert that at every moment throughout 

the history of every country the population is, and has keen, in- 

i Maltbus; The Principle of Population, 



COMPETITION 37 

creasing faster than the means of subsistence, then the law is cer- 
tainly false, but it should not be understood as so assorting. It 
merely means that, in the future as in the past, the population 
will finally overtake the means of subsistence, provided the 
causes which have operated in the past continue to operate in 
the future — provided the conduct of society is left to nature. 
Such a statement is incontrovertible, since there is obviously some 
density of population too large for the earth to support, and if 
the population of the earth is continuously increasing, it must 
be continually approaching that density. There have been many 
periods in the history of many countries when the means of 
subsistence increased faster than the population which was de- 
pendent upon them, and the present period in all civilized coun- 
tries is the most notable of them. This is due to the operation 
of the law of increasing returns which may, and at present does, 
more than offset the law of diminishing returns. Owing to the 
application of science or common sense to the business of pro- 
duction, the law of increasing returns never operated with such 
power as to-day, and were wealth fairly equally distributed, pov- 
erty would now be diminishing throughout the civilized world. 
Indeed, it is diminishing in some lands, notably in Australia, 
t and New Zealand, and even in the United States its increase, ex- 
cept locally, is a matter of debate. 

As the pressure of a population upon its means of subsistence 
becomes greater, effort is made to find a means of relief, and 
this is found in migration. Migration always takes place from 
points where the pressure of population is greater to points where 
it is less, just as water in two vessels communicating with one 
another always flows from the higher level to the lower. Such 
was the cause of the great influxes which successively flooded 
Europe from the East in the early part of the Christian Era, 
and such is the cause of the migration from Europe and Asia 
to America in our day. Precisely the same phenomenon is to 
be observed among animals — they continually extend their range 
in search of the means of subsistence until checked by some nat- 
ural agency. Migration, while it tends to relieve temporarily 
the pressure of population in the country from which it takes 
place, increases that pressure in the country to which it pro- 
ceeds, just as water moving from a higher vessel to a lower one, 
while it lowers the level in the first, raises it in the second vessel. 
Left to itself, the process of migration will continue, until in all 
accessible countries the pressure of population upon resources 
has been brought to the same point, and then by the increase of 



THE POLITICS OF CTTIUTT 

population, all will increase their pressure together. That is, 
migration al best can resull only in temporary relief, and in the 
end it merely hastens the day of final equilibrium. Population 
will finally come to the Bame pressure in all Lands having inter- 
communication, just as water will finally come to the same level 
in all vessels having inter-communication. The rate of migra- 
tion will depend upon facility of communication and transporta- 
tion, just as the rate at which water Hows from one vessel to an- 
other will depend upon the friction in the passage by which they 
communicate. Where the facilities of inter-communication be- 
tween countries are primitive and poor, migration will he slow; 
where they are perfected, it will he rapid. Two or three cen- 
turies ago migration across the Atlantic was a slow operation, 
because the means of communication were poor. With the 
means furnished to-day a whole nation can migrate in a single 
year. 

The tendency under competition then is for population to in- 
crease in quantity and extend in range. Whether this tendency 
is a good or a had one will depend upon whether the output of 
happiness of the average individual is positive or negative, and 
if positive, whether the consumption of said individual is above 
or below the point of maximum efficiency. In the chapter on 
the third factor of happiness, we have shown under what condi- 
tions increase of population is good, and under what conditions 
it is had. Nothing can be more fatal and fatuous than the pre- 
vailing idea that a Large population is a good thing for a nation. 
Until the conditions of life are at least such that the average 
man can produce a positive surplus of happiness an increase of 
population is not so good as a decrease. It appears to be the 
prevailing opinion that one hundred miserahle persons are better 
than ten happy ones, and that the ideal of a modern state should 
he to become overpopulated like India and China. Hence that 
state whose rapidity of approach to such an overpopulated condi- 
tion ig the highest — other things being equal — is considered 
the most successful. Wherever any considerable degree of pov- 
erty prevail- increase of population is a national disease, for 
poverty is an unfailing sign that the conditions insuring an aver- 
age positive out put of happiness have not been met; much l< 
the conditions insuring maximum efficiency of consumption. 
It is clear that if everything is left to nature the time must 
•ilually come, if it has not come already, when the world will 
be overpopulated, and when each human being born will hut add 
to the BUrplus of mi-cry. Now if we are to judge a system hy its 



COMPETITION 39 

effects upon happiness it is a matter of indifference when its 
effects are produced. Happiness or misery are no better and 
no worse in the year 10,000 B. C. than in the year 10,000 A. I). 
If they are, then there is no reason why they are not better or 
worse on Wednesdays than on Thursdays. Whatever checks may 
be locally or temporarily applied, there is but one way of pre- 
venting final overpopulation, and that is by stopping the growth 
of population before it reaches, or even remotely approaches, the 
point where nature will stop it by starvation. It is universally 
admitted that competition will not do this, and has not the 
slightest tendency to do it — hence on this ground alone, benefi- 
cence must be denied it. The output of misery of a world 
brought to equilibrium by nature's expedient — starvation — 
would be beyond computation. Perhaps, however, it may be ob- 
jected that the discussion of this question is too remote for any 
human interest, since the earth is yet very far from overpopulated, 
and our concern is with the present. Such an objection, I appre- 
hend, will occur to many readers. But it should not be forgot- 
ten that our primary purpose in this examination is to discover 
whether or not competition is a beneficent process. If it is, 
it will meet the test we have applied — otherwise not. 

Perhaps, however, to the objection mentioned, a more cogent 
reply may be made, viz., that if overpopulation means a popula- 
tion whose output of happiness under the conditions actually ex- 
isting is negative, then the world is now, and always has been, 
overpopulated — the popular opinion to the contrary notwith- 
standing. In a world where there is more unhappiness than 
happiness a population of one is too great. Can it be then that 
the average man in the world to-day produces a negative output 
— a surplus of unhappiness? If so, the output of the world 
must be negative. Perhaps the reader may admit this is no 
more than an axiom. Perhaps, on the contrary, he may regard 
it as utterly absurd. It depends very much upon his knowledge 
of the world. All men are prone to judge of the world by the 
portion of it which surrounds them. If they and their friends 
are happy, they deem the world happy — if they and their 
friends are unhappy, they deem the world unhappy, for verily 
one-half the world knows not how the other half lives. No sta- 
tistics exist which can substantiate our assertion, and if the 
declamations of exuberant politicians can refute anything we 
are refuted. But a moderately accurate test is available — let 
us apply it — it will be better than none. 

The United States of America is generally conceded to be 



40 THE POII1 K 8 OF UTILITY 

rid — al 
pn railing opii »pe is inclii 

In i . and in 

ul 
be coi ' rk. 

■ 
pould j l1 civilization we n 

N •'■ 5Tork is the rich most p 

in America. 1 1 I 
italistic system has produced i 

. York i ' of wli, • 

a mechanism for producing happiness we can 
be accused i an unfavorable example of its handiwoi 

for il city of the most ul counl 

in the world. 

cording to the utilitarian standard no individual or 
of individuals can be considered a success whose con- 
ation i" the total happiness of : - negative. A 
l.c a a IU8< produce, in an . hedon-hours in 
>n-hours. It- output per day or p<T year n 
rue of New York ( lity ? To tl 
will answer either yes or no. If his ans he 
concede the capitalistic system is a failur< — t 
besl it can produce ig worse than nothing, [f :■ 
I invite him to apply two tests, which, if he is familiar 
with the metropolis, or with s . he can do with no 
more trouble to himself than five minutes candid re!' 

I invite him in imagination to walk t ! 1 visit 

habitations of I I metropolis by day and by ind 

. to note I uces of pleasure and pain with an im- 

Lel him visit the houses of the rich, the well-to- 
and the middle classes, and observe their habits and their i 
happiness. Are they ever unhappy — if so, how many hours 
and what is the intensity of their unhappiness — he may 
hours of product ion they are, on the 
e, not happy, though the intensity of pain during th< 
may be bul slighl — and certainly half of their wal. 
life Ql in production. Are the *PPy — 'f 8°> ' r L fl 

during hours of consumption, while eating, attendii 

playing 
qui( e with family or friends. Now many hour- a day 

and what is th< e intern 

e hours ? I - it om , ten hedons — it m 



COMPETITION 41 

be of some average intensity — we cannot determine what, but let 
the reader estimate from his own experience. Let him repeal these 
observations among the much greater multitude who live by the 
labor of their hands, ranging from the moderately poor to the 
tut< — what is their average duration of consumption, and 
what the intensity thereof? Let him go through the magnificent 
palace of the millionaire, but let him also visit the squalid tene- 
ment of the victim of poverty, outnumbering the first, five hun- 
dred to one. Let him not ignore the happiness to be found in 
the homes of the well-to-do, the healthy, the morally wholesome 
— but neither let him ignore the unhappiness to be found 
in the tenement houses, the hospitals, the alms-houses, the gut- 
ters, the jails, and the dives. Taking a bird's eye view of these 
things, let him candidly ask himself this question: Would you, 
or would you not, be willing to experience all the pain felt in 
New York in a year, for all the pleasure felt there in the same 
time? This is but inquiring whether the totality of life in New 
York is self-supporting. An affirmative answer means that the 
total product of the city is, at least, better than nothing. A 
ive answer means that it is worse than nothing. How many 
men who knew that they would be taken literally at their word, 
would dare to answer in the affirmative? 

A second test is suggestible which may perhaps be more readily 
put into practice than this one. If, as we have contended, the 
tesl of equivalence of pleasure and pain is preference, as deter- 
mined by memory rather than anticipation, then the test of 
whether a given period has resulted in a surplus of pain or 
pleasure to an individual is best ascertained by determining 
whether that individual would prefer living over again that pe- 
riod, or one containing exactly the same quantities of pleasure 
and pain, to not living it over again. Let this test be applied 
to the average citizen of New York for an average day or an 
average year — not to an exceptional citizen for an exceptional 
day or an exceptional year. The average man in New York is 
a laborer; he can avail himself of no more, and generally of less, 
labor than that which he himself supplies. The average woman 
in New York is a laborer also, though not necessarily a wage 
laborer. Let inquiry be made of the average adult dweller in 
York at the close of an average day whether he or she is 
glad or sorry that the day is done — whether he or she would 
prefer living it over again to not living it over again, just as it 
was. Can there be any doubt of the result of such an inquiry? 
If bo, I have yet met nobody who cherished one. If it be ob- 



42 



THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 



fatigue fell at the i lay of labor pre- 

cludefl a fair judgment at that time (a fair objection) the in- 
quiry may b< I, applying t<> a we* . >nth, a year or a 
i period matters little. Pew, even among the 
a balan 3 ir favor, and the 
woman undoubtedly produces a sur- 
inhappiness. T child in Now York is • 

ctly to the attrition of competition, 
and it is among the children, if anywhere, t : 

will l)o found; yet, when the conditions of the a\ 
child'* d New York are considered, it will be acknowli 

rial com tend to diminish the output 

even 1 , the most immediately useful members <>f the human 

: and it is very doubtful, considering the prevalence of il 

's life in New York is self-supporting. 
If it be objected that the average individual musl deem life 
worth living or ho would nol consent to live, wo may reply that 
incurable invalids, life convicts, and many who cannot possibly 
produce a positive surplus, consent to live and arc reluctant to 
die. It i- not because they have any reasonable 

iiture will be an improvement upon the past that men 
•o live — it is from the fear of death — an ineradicable in- 
stinct, common alike to men and animal-. Men do not live from 
d hut from impulse. They live in perpetual hope that the 
-lav will ho better than the last, and they are perpetually 
disappointed. It is not only in great cities that the average indi- 
vidual product- a negative surplus. It is a universal condition 
and it has always been so. The relation between man and his 
environment has never been such as to produce a positive sur- 
plus over any considerable period ^( time, and keen observers 
of human life have not failed to record the fact. Men live on 
They ** eat the air promise crammed.* 3 Say- Mont- 
gomery : 

u Wh<> thai hath rvcv been 
( lould bear t.» be no m< 1 
Set who would tread again the scene 
Be tr<>d through life b ton I " 

Dryden hae wed the same idea more perfectly in his 

Aur< 

" Wh. d I consider life *ti< all a c! 
V • ' I'd with hope, men favour th< 

Trust i d, and think to-morrow will repay. 



COMPETITION 43 

To-morrow's falser than the former day; 
Lies worse, and while it says we shall be blest 
With some new joys, cuts off what we possest. 
Strange cozenage ! none would live past years again, 
Yet all hope pleasure in what yet remain ; 
And from the dregs of life think to receive 
What the first sprightly running could not give." 

Pope condenses the same sentiment into his famous couplet : 

" Hope springs eternal in the human breast ; 
Man never is, but always to be blest." 

Shakespeare in Hamlet's well known soliloquy says that only 
" the dread of something after death " induces men " to grunt 
and sweat under a weary life " and Byron in defending his own 
estimate of the " nothingness of life " shows that he is but ex- 
pressing an opinion common to the thinking portion of man- 
kind: 

"I say no more than has been said in Dante's 
Verse, and by Solomon and Cervantes ; " 

"By Swift, by Machiavel, by Rochefoucault, 
By Fenelon, by Luther, and by Plato ; 
By Tillotson, and Wesley, and Rousseau, 
Who knew this life was not worth a potato." 

But if all this be true, if the human race inevitably achieves 
more unhappiness than happiness as a result of its existence, what 
shall we say of the system which produces this result? Perhaps 
we cannot condemn it for no better may be attainable ; but this 
much, at least, may be said, that under such a system the less 
the number of human beings who exist the better; for the less 
the number the less will be the surplus of unhappiness, and none 
at all will be the ideal number. In other words, the annihila- 
tion of the human race is a better policy — a more just policy, 
than any form of competition thus far known. Annihilation 
would, to be sure, extinguish human happiness, but it would at 
the same time extinguish human unhappiness, and it is as true 
of an aggregate of individuals as it is of a single one, that non- 
existence is better than a surplus of pain, however slight. This 
conclusion follows from the very meaning of the word better, 
and if the reader thinks that he has in mind a meaning of that 



44 THE POLITICS of I'TILm 

word which does not involve such a conclusion, I recommend 
that he attempt to express it to himself. 

Prom these considerations then, we may infer that the city 

of New York, the crowning achievement of the modern com- 
petitive system in the western world, yield- a less output of 
happiness ]>er acre per day or year than when Eendrick Hudson 
ivered its site — that it was more useful as an undiscovered 
wilderness than it is to-day, and contributed more to that output 
whirh it is the only useful object of society to produce — hap- 
piness. What then shall we think of all the lucubration about 
prosperity and national greatness so frequently heard? What 
relation, if any, have these things to utility? It would seem to 
he the height of presumption lor any nation, or any representa- 
tive of a nation, to boast (^\' its success when universal annihila- 
tion would result in still greater success — at least a greater suc- 
in the production of anything which it is worth while to 
produce. 

If we go outside the great cities of America into the rural dis- 
tricts and apply either of the tests we have suggested, there can 
be little doubt that the sail" condition will be discovered — a 
surplus of unhappiness is produced — few will be found who 
would wish to live their lives over again year by year; but it is 
significant that the output of unhappiness is less. Not on! 
per square mile, but less per average individual than in the 
city. The least unhappy portions of a great industrial country 
are the quiet farming districts, and these are precisely the parts 
of the country in which the capitalistic system of competition 
has reached the least development. Few will be inclined to 
deny this proposition, and yet what a commentary it furnishes 
upon the achievements of modern civilization. It is true that 

city more and more attracts the dweller in the country, but 
this is because he counts the chances of success and discounts 
- of failure. He notices the luxury — he ignores the 
squalor. lb' enters city life as he would a gigantic lottery, 

Dnly the prizes; but, as in any lottery, the prizes are for the 
few — the blanks for the many — and this is particularly true of 

jreai lottery of competition. The few who succeed are con- 
spicuous; the many who fail are not ; and thus the real condition 
of things is concealed. In the country, competition is lesssevere, 
wealth more evenly distributed, health more general, and were 
the indicative ratio and with it the education of the people in- 
creased, the country districts of America would doubtless begin 
to produce a positive output even with no other change. 



Chap. XI] COMPETITION 45 

The normal operation of competition to continually increase 
population then is simply a means of increasing unhappiness, 
and the migrations which result from this increase are a means 
of equalizing unhappiness — of insuring that wherever free com- 
munication between one nation and another exists that the level 
of happiness shall everywhere seek the lowest point — for under 
such conditions if one nation maintains a low level of happiness 
it is only a question of time when all ethers will sink to the 
same level. The pressure of population upon subsistence will 
tend always to increase and to equalize, just as among animals. 

If, as we have sought to show by the best tests available, the 
United States is not a self-supporting community, how much 
greater must be the negative margin of self-support in those 
countries from which the pressure of population continually 
forces a stream of migration. to our shores. In Europe, with the 
possible exception of France and Switzerland, despite the sim- 
pler tastes of the people, the output of misery per capita is 
doubtless higher than in the United States. All the baleful 
effects of competition contribute to this result, but the most 
potent is that caused by overpopulation which is greater in Europe 
than in America simply because the unrestricted natural laws 
of increase have operated for a longer period there than here. 
In yet more ancient communities where competition has been 
unrestricted for longer periods the conditions are worse than in 
Europe. In India and China the output of misery is appalling. 
So closely have these, the most ancient nations in the world, ap- 
proached the limit of their means of subsistence, that even a 
partial crop failure means a famine in which hundreds of thou- 
sands, and often millions, die of starvation. The population of 
all these old countries is almost at the point of equilibrium, but 
it is not a beneficent equilibrium — it is the equilibrium of 
nature where starvation places a limit which propagation forever 
strives to exceed. It is the ideal furnished by these densely 
populated countries that the publicists of our time would have 
us approach, and approach as quickly as possible. The pop- 
ulation cannot grow fast enough to suit them, and they seek to 
stimulate it in every way. ^Yithout seeking to inquire whether 
the average individual produces a positive or negative surplus, 
they would hurry the nation toward the point of natural equi- 
librium and maximum output of misery as rapidly as possible, 
on the principle that a great number of miserable beings are 
better than a less number of happy ones. It is perhaps useless 
to seek to eradicate this notion of the economists of the age, but 



THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

fute the argument by which they seek to 
their opinions. This is, in effect, that, owing to the ad- 
improvements in the efficient I 
action, the civilized countries of the western world can 
port a much denser population in comfort than the backward 
countries support in discomfort, and hence I 

i- no fear of overpopulation at this stage of our progr< bs. Now 
it may he acknowledged that with the mean- of production at 
hand America, lor example, cam support a Large population in 
comfort, hut this doc- not involve the acknowledgment that it 
It may be acknowledged that owing to the causes men- 
condition of the average man in western countr 
r than it ever was before; nevertheless this is far from ac- 
knowledging that any community yet produces a positive surplus 
of happiness. This cannot he until the average man is willing 
and anxious to live his average day, or month, or yea . again 

— and even could it be shown that a given community was 
supporting, this would not mean that an increase in its numbers 
would be desirable. Only communities whose consumption per 
capita is greater than that required for maximum efficient 
consumption can economically increase in numbers, and will 
anyone contend that any community has yet attained such a 
stag 

But perhaps in the last paragraph wo have made an admission 
which i- significant. If it must be acknowledged that in this, 
apitalistic Bystem of competition, the condition 
of the average individual is better than ever before, surely the 
capitalistic system cannot be wholly had. It must have it- ad- 
vantages if it is responsible for such a Mate of things. The fact 
i-, the capitalistic system is not wholly bad. It lias one great 
utage, and it is due to this, and to a variety oi resl 
upon competition, that the present improvement in man's 
g been brought about — an improvement slight in 
compared with what is accomplishable by a different adapta- 
same mean-. Intelligent men believe competition 
I because they are ignorant of its effects when really 
unrestricted. If they are interested to learn what these effects 
. they nerd hut to ascertain what they have I" 

rtory of English industrial life during the 
the 19th century, a- told by Marx in his work 
on "Capital/ 3 or that by Dr. Cay on the "Moral and Phy* 

i of the Laboring Classes in England," or let him 
read any of the reports bo liberally used by these authors. The 



COMPETITION 47 

story is too long to quote in detail here; it must be read in de- 
tail to be appreciated, but as a brief and inadequate condensa- 
tion of its tragic details the following account by E. J. James 
is worth inspection : 

" The doctrine so long current in political economy and ex- 
pressed in the motto laissez faire passer, has been thoroughly- 
exploded by the logic of circumstances. No better proof of this 
could be desired than the factory laws of modern industrial nations, 
laws which have been of late warmly defended by economists of 
every school. The reaction begun by Adam Smith against the 
paternal theory and practice of contemporary governments re- 
sulted in an illogical and untenable theory of the state and its 
functions. t Free Competition ' was the panacea for all eco- 
nomical ills of society. Everyone was to be free to sell his own 
labor and that of his family where he could obtain the most for 
it, and free to make such contracts as he would or could. As 
England was the first great industrial state of modern times, so 
in England the results of such a policy first showed themselves 
i:i all their nakedness. The most merciless exploitation of the 
weaker elements of society by the stronger became the rule. The 
manufacturers, in their thirst for wealth, paid as little attention 
to the health of their operatives as they chose. The laborers in 
their necessity were compelled to accept what terms were offered. 
The labor of the father soon became insufficient to support the 
family. The mother had to go into the coal mine or factory. It 
was not enough; the children were sent into the mines and fac- 
tories. They were compelled to work ten or fifteen hours a day 
for seven days in the week, in narrow, illy ventilated and dirty 
factory rooms or in still more unhealthy mines. The result of 
such work was, of course, the moral and physical deterioration of 
the children and a steady degeneration, of the laborers from decade 
to decade. The conditions prevailing in Great Britain during 
the latter part of the last century (the 18th) and the early part 
of the present century would be entirely incredible were they not 
well attested by the testimony of unimpeachable witnesses. So 
crying did the evil become that in 1802, an act was passed ' for 
the preservation of the health and morals of apprentices and others 
employed in cotton and other mills and cotton and other fac- 
tories.' This bill owed its passage to the ravages of epidemic dis- 
eases in the factory districts of Manchester. The illy fed and 
overworked children in the factories formed the very best field for 
the development and spread of epidemic and contagious diseases. 
Pauper children were sent in crowds from the agricultural dis- 
tricts of the Southern counties to the manufacturing regions of 



4S THE politics OF niUTY 

tin* northern counties. They were apprenticed to the mill owners 
and mercilessly overworked and underfed." ' 

The narration of which this extract is the commencement 
Bhowe whal unrestricted competition does for the produce 

a nation. It illustrates what competition would do were the 
restrictions imposed by labor organizations and the govern- 
ment removed. If Let alone the condition- described would 
extend to practically all industries, and final 1 v affect the whole 
laboring population. They represent what the dogmatic econo- 
mist calls the most a economic" conditions of production, con- 
ditions which, it' attained, will assure the most complete sn 
in the race for commercial supremacy. Indeed, the busi- 
aess men of that day contended that to interfere with these 
conditions meant ruin to England's industries. When things 
became so had that the English government prepared to "med- 
dle " by passing the Factory Acts there was great alarm and 
indignation among the conservative and respectable factory op- 
erators whose " rights M were threatened. They protested with 
all the vehemence of disinterested patriotism against any in- 
terference with the beneficent natural laws which were doing 
so much for England's commercial prosperity. The Factory 
Acts, nevertheless, were passed, interfering with " prosperity " 
in the interests of happiness. As they merely dabble with the 
matter, however, they have not done much toward abolishing 
the vast annual deficit of happiness produced by the British 
ile; though they certainly have diminished it. 
Advancement in the arts then does not injure happiness, though 
doubtless it can be made the means of supporting in comfort 
a greater population than in its absence can be supported in 
discomfort, but not while competition is in control. In fact, it 
may be shown that even the single and much proclaimed advan- 
tage of the capitalistic system — its stimulus to the use of ma- 
chinery in the arts — is in reality a disadvantage. Suppose, for 
example, that modern methods of production were introduced 
into India and the competitive system were permitted to remain 
in control. What would happen? A temporary Blight rise in 
rate of consumption per capita would be the first effect, hut 
the increase in the moan- of subsistence would promptly result 
in a of the death rate, and an increase in the popula- 

tion — the faster the mean- of subsistence increased the Easter 

1 Cyclopaedia of political Science, edited by .John J. Lalor, Vol. II, p. 
LSI, 



COMPETITION 49 

would the population increase to meet it, until the limit of 
the agricultural resources of the country, on which depends the 
limit of the population, would, even with improved methods, 
be again practically attained. Perhaps in India where the 
population is already dense, it might by this means be stimu- 
lated to increase several fold, and what would be the result — 
the same final rate of consumption per capita, the same final 
output of misery per capita would be attained, and the total 
output of misery would be increased several-fold. Such would 
be the result of improving methods of production by the appli- 
cation of science and leaving consumption to the beneficence 
of nature. Indeed, science thus half applied is a curse instead 
of a blessing. That which advancement in the arts would do 
for India it will do for the United States under competitive 
conditions; for the population of the country will either in- 
crease as fast as in the past, or it will not. If it does its 
failure to increase as fast as in the past can only mean that the 
sole competitive check which exists — the Law of Malthus — 
has begun to operate and will continue to do so until natural 
equilibrium, like that in India, is attained. If, on the con- 
trary, it does not, it will show that the Law of Malthus is not 
operative. In the past, the population has several times doubled 
in less than thirty years, say three times in a century. Assum- 
ing the present population to be 80,000,000 and this rate of 
increase to be maintained, the population in one century will 
be 640,000,000, in two centuries will be over 5,000,000,000, 
and in three centuries will be over 40,000,000,000. Does any 
one suppose the country can support the last two numbers in 
comfort, or even in a condition of self-support? Do they sup- 
pose it can support even 640,000,000 at, or anywhere near, the 
point of maximum efficiency? Certainly not with competi- 
tion, and it is doubtful if, with the most perfect system devis- 
able, it could be done, even with half such a population. As 
Sir William Crookes 1 has shown, the wheat acreage is already 
approaching its limits, and though these can be extended and 
the yield per acre increased by the application of science, the 

i"The Wheat Problem" G. P. Putnam's Sons, Publishers, 1900. 
In an essay incorporated in this work, John Hyde, Chief Statistician 
of the U. S. Agricultural Department, says: 

" That for general agricultural purposes the public domain is prac- 
tically exhausted, and that, consequently, there can be no further con- 
siderable additions to the farm area of the country, is too well-estab- 
lished a fact to be the subject of controversy." (p. 197.) 
4 






THE POLITICS OF I'TILIIV 



Year 

1800 1810 1820 1830 1840 1850 I860 1870 1880 1890 1900 



110 
105 
100 
95 
90 
85 
80 
75 



'B 



GO 



m 50 



INCREASE OF POPULATION 

UNITED 'STATES 

AND THE 

PRINCIPAL COUNTRIES OF EUROPE 

FROM 

1800 to 1900. 




no 

105 

100 

95 

90 

85 

80 

75 

70 

65 

60 

55 

50 

45 

40 

35 

30 

25 

20 

15 

10 



1800 1810 1820 1830 1840 1850 I860 1870 1880 189 

Fig. I. 



COMPETITION 51 

yield cannot be indefinitely augmented. The same thing is 
true of other agricultural resources. The law of diminishing 
returns cannot forever be more than neutralized by the law 
of increasing returns; and what is true of agriculture is true 
of mineral resources, particularly of the coal supply. 

Of course, no such rate of increase of population as that 
we have assumed will or can be maintained ; for the very rea- 
son that it will be checked by the Law of Malthus. A glance 
at Fig. 1, showing the rate of increase of population in various 
countries during the 19th century, according to the report of 
the 12th Census of the United States, exhibits the effect of 
this law. Thus the sparsely settled countries (the United 
States and Eussia) have increased most rapidly; the accelera- 
tion in the case of the former country being due in part to 
immigration. x\mong densely populated countries it is those 
in which the operation of the law of increasing returns has been 
most stimulated by improvement in the arts that have made 
the greatest gains (The United Kingdom, Germany, and Aus- 
tria-Hungary). Italy and France occupy an intermediate po- 
sition, while the most backward industrial countries (Spain, 
Sweden and Xorway, and Turkey) have increased least in popu- 
lation. Owing to our proficience in the arts, however, we shall 
eventually be able to support a much greater density of popula- 
tion, and produce a far greater output of wealth and misery 
than any of the countries of Europe and Asia do now. 

The proper way of adjusting population to a diminishing 
return of wealth is by a decrease in the birth rate, but this is not 
nature's way in man any more than in animals. Only a rela- 
tively high rate of consumption per capita can set in operation 
the prudential motives which keep human beings from breed- 
ing too fast, and this cannot be attained by any system, which, 
like that of competition, destroys the efficiency of consump- 
tion, however much it may increase the efficiency of produc- 
tion. Thus it becomes clear that the improvement in the arts 
which the modern form of competition promotes is a tempo- 
rary good, but a permanent evil, or certain to become so if the 
increase of population is left to nature. 

And now to return to the effect of all this on the natural 
resources of the earth (p. 2-i). The greatly increased facility 
of developing nature's resources through improvement in the 
arts and the great increase in the number of human beings en- 
gaged in their development, simply accelerates their depletion 
without accomplishing anything useful by it. The resources 



THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

which, if properly applied, would result in a vast production 
of happiness arc by the competitive system, dissipated with 
aothing — with less than nothing — to show for their dissipa- 
•I. in the modem world the prevailing production-mad- 
oess goads the capitalist, who has everything to gain from 
"skinning" the country, into opening up and " developing ** 
its resources, and what is the final result — abandoned farms 
where once were virgin soils — treeless wastes where one 

greal forest huge water-filled caverns in the earth wh< 

once was valuable ore. The resources are certainly "devel- 
oped," hut what lias the nation to show for it — a vast and 
increasing surplus of misery, and tin's wo are told is suca 
Such a policy as this may please a few capitalists in one gen- 
eration, hut what of posterity? If, under the present system, 
men cannot produce a surplus of happiness while living on 
the cream of the earth's resources, what will they do under the 
same system when, with numbers indefinitely increased, they 
musl live on the skimmed milk? So abysmal is the ignorance 
on this matter that the very men who are hailed as public 
benefactors because of their haste to develop the resources of 
the nation, are in reality the worst enemies of the state. 

If the rapid development of the nation's resources is indeed 
a desideratum, then let us by all means hasten it. Let us in 
America, for example, bring in hordes of laborers from China, 
supply them with the most improved machinery, make them 
work sixteen hours a day at the minimum wage, and work day 
and night shifts to "develop" onr resources. Lei them ex- 
hausl the soils, deplete the mines, level the forests, and extermi- 
nate the beasts of the field and the birds of the air. and let 
them keep at it until they have accomplished their work. By 
this means the land may be made a desert several centuri 
sooner than it could by the methods now in use — and thus 
our success will he the wonder and the admiration of the a 
If we adopt this policy no nation can hope to compete with us 
for the commercial supremacy of the earth. England and Ger- 
many, unless they imitate our methods, will not he factors in 
the race for a moment. If an enormous rate of production ^( 
wealth is the objed of national existence, this is the way to ob- 
tain it. and the sooner we gel at it the better. If the practo- 
maniacs of the age dare to ho consistent with themselves, let 
them advocate this policy. If, on the other hand, our object 
i! enormous rate of production of happiness, v. 1 pur- 

te policy. The resources ^i' the country should 



COMPETITION 53 

be conserved and husbanded with the greatest care; their de- 
velopment should be delayed as long as possible; the activities 
of men should be turned to developing individuals who are 
fitted to convert the potentiality of happiness involved in na- 
tional resources into actual happiness; the efficiency of con- 
sumption should be stimulated and then, when the husbanded 
resources are at last developed, the nation will have something 
to show for their dissipation. On page 318 1 we have already 
discussed this matter and further repetition is not required 
here. All we need point out is that the capitalistic system, in 
developing a country, wastes its resources instead of using them. 
In Chapter 8 2 we have set forth the effects on the several 
elements of happiness required of a just social system. We are 
now in a position to compare these effects with those which 
modern competition tends to produce. Thus: 

(1) A just system aims to improve the quality of human 
beings. 

Competition tends to deteriorate it. 

(2) A just system seeks a high degree of adjustability and 
health. 

Competition secures a low degree. 

(3) A just system conserves natural resources until a high 
efficiency of consumption is developed. 

Competition dissipates natural resources, at the same time 
maintaining a low efficiency of consumption. 

(4) A just system substitutes machinery for men in produc- 
tion, simultaneously increasing the indicative ratio. 

Competition displaces men with machinery, without simul- 
taneously increasing the indicative ratio. 

(5) A just system stimulates a high degree of skill and 
interest in labor. 

Competition stimulates a low degree of skill and interest in 
all save directive labor. 

(6) A just system seeks equality in distribution of wealth 
and leisure. 

Competition secures inequality in both. 

(7) A just system seeks to so adjust the indicative ratio as 
to secure maximum efficiency per capita, by making it a direct 
function of productive power, productive intensity, and con- 
sumptive power. 

iOf The Economy of Happiness. 2 ibid. 






U 'J in-; POLITICS OF UTILITY 

< mpetition tends only to make it an inverse function of 
endurance and diminish it indefinitely. 

(8) A jusl system Beeks to adjusl a population to its means 
of happint maintain it at the point of beneficent equi- 

librium. 

Competition adjusts population only to its means of subs 
ence, leading to natural equilibrium. 

i mpetition then has not a single good point. On every vital 

issue 11 is opposed to a jusl Bystem. It deteriorate- the quality 

population, it destroys the efficiency of consumption, 

and even Buch good effect as it has on the efficiency of produo- 

■1 is thereby turned into an evil which is only made n 
terrible by its effect in indefinitely increasing the population. 
In other words, the system of competition is to-day but a more 
ient form of what it always has been — a mechanism for 
maintaining and continually increasing an output of unhappini 
Pi rfected by Bcience, this mechanism if its use be persisted in, 
will cause the earth eventually to become a very hell in which 
the sensitive organization of human beings is utilized in the 
highly successful manufacture of misery. There is no m< 
dismal delusion than that of the beneficence of competition. 
It is a political myth a- gross as, and vastly more harmful 
than, the myth- of ancient and modern mythology, and by 
coming generations it will he placed in the same category. It 
remain- to be seen whether common sense can. with sufficient 
promptness and completeness, triumph over custom to destroy 
this delusion and the system founded upon it, and substitute 
r an applied science whose object is the manufacture of 
happint 3s. Tl e signs of the time- give reason to believe that 
such a triumph i- coming Boon, and in the following chapter 

-hall attempt to point out the course of events by which this 
"consummation devoutly to be wished" is to be attained. 



CHAPTER III 

PRIVATE AND PUBLIC MONOPOLY 

Human society, like much else in nature, is a product of 
evolution, and evolution consists either in progress or in retro- 
gression. In the history of the forms of animal and vegetable 
life both processes have occurred, and both have occurred in the 
history of human society. In the last chapter has been 
discussed the effect upon human happiness of the modes of 
activity of that phase in the evolution of society denominated 
the capitalistic system. This form of social mechanism was de- 
veloped out of the feudal system of mediaeval Europe through 
several intermediate stages and at the present time is in process 
of undergoing transformation into another form. What that 
form is to be was foreshadowed by Marx in his discussion of 
the " Historical Tendency of Capitalist Accumulation," as 
follows : 

" What does the primitive accumulation of capital, i. e., its 
historical genesis, resolve itself into? In so far as it is not im- 
mediate transformation of slaves and serfs into wage-laborers, and 
therefore a mere change of form, it only means the expropriation 
of the immediate producers, i. e., the dissolution of private prop- 
erty based on the labour of its owner. Private property, as the 
antithesis to social, collective property, exists only where the means 
of labour and the external conditions of labour belong to private 
individuals. But according as these private individuals are la- 
bourers or not labourers, private property has a different character. 
The numberless shades that it at first sight presents, correspond 
to the intermediate stages lying between these two extremes. The 
private property of the labourer in his means of production is the 
foundation of petty industry, whether agricultural, manufactur- 
ing, or both; petty industry, again, is an essential condition for 
the development of social production, and of the free individuality 
of the labourer himself. Of course, this petty mode of produc- 
tion exists also under slavery, serfdom, and other states of de- 
pendence. But it flourishes, it lets loose its whole energy, it 
attains its adequate classical form, only where the labourer is the 
private owner of his own means of labour set in action by him- 

55 



5G THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

nt of the land which he cultivates, the artizan 
the tool which he handles as a virtuoso. This mode of produc- 
tion pre-supposes parcelling of the Boil, and scattering of the 
other means of production. As it excludes the concentration 
these mean-, of production, so also it excludes co-operation, divi- 
: within each separate process of production, the 
• r, and the productive application of the f< 
by . and the free development of the social pfoducti 

powers. It is compatible only with a system of production, and 
a moving within narrow and more or less primitive 

hound-. To perpetuate it would be, as Pecqueur rightly 
1 to decree universal mediocrity.' At a certain stage of develop- 
ment it brings forth the material agencies for its own dissolu- 
tion. From thai moment new forces and new passions Bpring 
up in the bosom of Bociety; but the old social organization I 
ters them and keeps them down. It must he annihilated; it is 
annihilated. It- annihilation, the transformation of the indi- 
vidualized and scattered means of production into socially con- 
centrated one-, of the pigmy property of the many into the h 
property of the few, the expropriation of the great mass of the 

pie from the soil, from the means of subsistence, and from 
the means of labour, this fearful and painful expropriation of 
the mass of the people forms the prelude to the history of cap- 
ital. It comprises a series of forcible method-, of which we 
have passed in review only those that have been epoch-making 
as methods of the primitive accumulation of capital. The ex- 
propriation of the immediate producers was accomplished with 
merciless vandalism, and under the stimulus of passions the most 
infamous, the most sordid, the pettiest, the mosl meanly odious. 
Self-earned private property, that is based, so to say. on the fus- 
ing together of the isolated, independent labouring-individual 
with the conditions of his labour, is supplanted by capitalistic 
private property, which rests on exploitation of the nominally 
free labour of others, i. e., on wages-labour. 

i A- soon as this process of transformation has sufficiently 
mposed the old Bociety from top to bottom, as sooh as the 
labourei turned into proletarians, their means of labour 

into capital, as soon as the capitalist mode of production stands 
on it-, own feet, then the further socialisation of labour, and 
further transformation of the land, and other means of produc- 
tion into socially exploited, and. therefore, common means «»f 
production, a- well ;i^ the further expropriation of private pro- 
prietors, takes a new form. Thai which is now to be expropri- 

! is ne longer the labourer working for himself, but the cap- 
italist exploiting many labourers. This expropriation is accom- 
by the action of the immanent law- of capitalistic pro- 

ition it-. -If, by the centralization of capital. One capitalist 
always kills many. Hand in hand with this centralization, or 



PRIVATE AND ITIJUC MONOPOLY :>7 

this expropriation of many capitalists by few, develops, on an 

• extending scale, the co-operative form of the labour-pr< 
the conscious technical application of science, the methodical 
cultivation of the soil, the transformation of the Lnstrumenl 

ir into instruments of labour only useable in common, the 
economizing of all means of production by their use as the 
moans of production of combined, socialized labour, the entangle- 
ment of all peoples in the net of the world-market, and with this, 
the international character of the capitalistic regime. Along 
with the constantly diminishing number of the magnates of cap- 
ital, who usurp and monopolise all advantages of this proce 
transformation, grows the mass of misery, oppression, slavery, 
'on, exploitation; but with this too grows the revolt of 
the working class, a class always increasing in numbers, and disci- 
plined, united, organized by the very mechanism of the process 
of capitalist production itself. The monopoly of capital becomes 
a fetter upon the mode of production, which has sprung up and 
flourished along with, and under it. Centralization of the means 
of production and socialization of labour at last reach a point 
where they become incompatible with their capitalist integument. 
This integument is burst assunder. The knell of capitalist pri- 
vate pro; mds. The expropriators are expropriated. 

" The capitalist mode of appropriation, the result of the cap- 
italist mode of jjroduction, produces capitalist private property. 
Tins is the first negation of individual private property, as founded 
on the labour of the proprietor. But capitalist production be- 
. with the inexorability of a law of Nature, its own negation. 
It is the negation of negation. This does not re-establish private 
property for the producer, but gives him individual property based 
on the acquisitions of the capitalist era: i. e., on co-operation and 
the possession in common of the land and of the means of pro- 
duction. 

"The transformation of scattered private property, arising 
from individual labour, into capitalist private property is, natu- 
rally, a process, incomparably more protracted, violent, and diffi- 
cult, than the transformation of capitalistic private property, al- 
ready practically resting on socialized production, into socialized 
property. In the former case, we have the expropriation of the 
of the people by a few usurpers; in the latter, we have the 
expropriation of a few usurpers by the mass of the people." 1 

Thus, more than fifty years ago, Marx predicted the evolution 
of the capitalistic system of competition into a system of private 
monopoly. He predicted also the leadership of the Onited 
States in this movement, and he points out its inevitable de- 
velopment into a system of public monopoly. It is interesting 

i Capital; pp. 786-789. 



58 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

to observe this evolution now in actual | i of operation. 

As Marx says, the fall of capitalism is to be much more rapid 
than its rise. The Bystem of private monopoly had its incep- 
tion only about twenty-five years ago and yet its practical re- 
placement in the United States by public monopoly will, in all 
probability, he witnessed by the rising generation. 

Private monopoly follows capitalistic competition as effect 
follows cause. Were the industrial condition.- existing two 
generations ago to he re-established, they would again pass 
through the same stages and develop the same condition of 
private monopoly which they did before. The inconvenience, 
worry, and loss occasioned the capitalist by competition prompts 
him to seek a way to escape it. This can only be done by 
combination between competitors, and when by the coalescence 
of many small concerns into a few large ones the number of 
competitors has diminished, this becomes a relatively easy task. 
The earliest form of combination, known as pooling, consists 
simply of verbal agreements among competitors not to com- 
pete. The output of the commodity sold by them is restricted 
and the price fixed. Thereby the fearful wastes of competition 
are avoided and a profit to the combine insured. But, of course, 
the seller's gain is the buyer's loss; and as the public is directly 
or indirectly the buyer, the profit of the pool is at the cost of 
the public. To protect themselves against pooling most of the 
states of the Union, during the ? SO*s, passed laws making it 
illegal: and in 1890 Congress passed the Sherman anti-trust act 
to the same effect. Tn other words, by "meddling" legislative 
enactment the law-makers attempted to induce artificial com* 
petition. The laissez faire theory had already been converted 
into a dubious doctrine by the Factory Acts and other legislation. 
The Sherman law converted it into a farce. Competition, that 
beneficent natural law, develops by a natural process into private 
monopoly. Thereupon the learned law-givers, imbued with the 
innate beneficence of natural law. proceed to enact one. since 
nature fails them: the result being that curious anomaly — an 
artificial natural law — a law which is both natural and un- 
natural. Is it therefore both beneficent and not beneficent? 
We leave this question to political metaphysicians; but one 
thing is rare — it has not stopped pooling. A.s pooling a 
ments are merely verbal, ii is very difficull to get evidence of 
them except by the confession of one of the parties. They may 
be dissolved to-day and renewed to-morrow. The Sherman 

act. therefore, has remained little more than a dead letter. 



PRIVATE AND PUBLIC MONOPOLY 59 

To keep pooling agreements in moments of temptation, how- 
ever, requires a sense of honor, and this is something that busi- 
ness does not breed. The parties to the various pools formed, 
when they saw an opportunity of gain would frequently break 
their agreements and the combine would immediately crumble. 
Thus pools were continually dissolving, and though they con- 
tinually reformed under the blistering blows of competition, 
they were a very unsatisfactory form of combination. The pool, 
therefore, soon developed into the trust, so-called because it 
consisted of a company whose function was to hold the stock 
of competing companies in trust. Through the trustees or 
officers of the trust, the various companies were each assigned 
their part in the total production, the output was restricted and 
the price fixed as under the old pool, but the trust agreements 
were matters of record and could be legally enforced, and thus it 
w r as believed the ills developed under pooling could be remedied. 
But this source of strength was also a source of weakness. The 
trust agreements not being secret could be adduced as evidence 
in the courts and hence were subject to the attack of the anti- 
trust laws. These were, in many cases enforced, and a number 
of trusts lost their charters and were forced back into the pool- 
ing stage. 

The legal position of the trust becoming thus untenable 
through enforcement of state laws, a new device w r as tried. 
Holding companies were formed whose sole purpose of existence 
was the ownership of the stock of other companies. At first 
only one state, New Jersey, permitted the incorporation of such 
companies, but one was enough. The competitors formerly 
combined into trusts now combined into holding companies, 
secured a charter in New Jersey, and were then free to operate 
in any state they pleased without interference, since the attempt 
by any state to discriminate against a company not incorporated 
therein was, by the courts, interpreted as a regulation of inter- 
state commerce and hence illegal. The trust was thus dis- 
placed by the holding company and this is the device which 
prevails very largely to-day, though charters for such com- 
panies are now obtainable in several states. Holding com- 
panies, or in their absence, pools, have now multiplied in 
number to such a degree that the sale of all the principal 
articles of commerce in the United States is either wholly, or in 
large measure, removed from the realm of competition. Cap- 
italists, coerced by competition, have very generally ceased to 
compete. Laborers, in the formation and consolidation of labor 



GO THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

organizations, have followed the same trend and competition 
ween laborers J- diminishing from year to year. Thus pri- 
vate monopoly, predicted by Man as the inevitable outcome of 
competition, is in process of realization. The attempt of the 
anti-trust legislation to stop and reverse the evolution of Bociety 
by inducing artificial competition is a practical failure. The 
much vaunted victories of the Sherman law are technical vic- 
tories only. That law was not made to he impartially en- 
forced. To do so in the case of all railroads doing interstate 
business would result in chaos, and except in one or two c 
it has not been attempted, though the abolition of competition 
by combination among railroads is all but universal to-day. 
The enforcement of the Sherman law is, in fact, left to the dis- 
cretion of the executive and is thus a practical reversion to 
monarchical theories of government. It is a legislative license 
for executive fiat. 

The attempt to induce artificial competition having failed, the 
next step is acquiescence in, and national regulation of, private 
monopoly. President Eoosevelt, in his message to Congress of 
December 5th, 1905, suggests such acquiescence, and commends 
such regulation in the following words: 

" The fortunes amassed through corporate organization are now 
so large, and vest such power in those who wield them, as to make 
it a matter of necessity to give to the sovereign — that is, to the 
Government, which represents the people as a whole — some ef- 
fective power of supervision over their corporate use. In order 
to insure a healthy social and industrial life, every big corpora- 
tion Bhould he held responsible by, and be accountable to, some 
sovereign strong enough to control its conduct. I am in no sense 1 
hostile to corporations. This is an age of combination, and any 
►rl to prevent all combination will be not only useless, but in 
the end vicious, because of the contempt for law which the fail- 
ure to enforce law inevitably produces." 

The policy thus suggested may he denominated pseudo-SOcial- 
Ism : and to it the nation is now proceeding — with what result 
it i< too soon to say; hut we may with very slight knowledge of 
human nature rest assured that difficulties will be encountered 
— not transient, hut permanent difficulties — for this solution 
of the problem Leaves untouched the cause of the trouble — the 
rna] antagonism between the self-interest of the buyer and 
seller — between public interests and vested interests. This is 
the splinter that produces the fester. A poultice may reduce 
the inflammation some, but to effect a cure tin 1 splinter must 



PKIVATE AND PUBLIC MONOPOLY Gl 

be removed. The only way to relieve the public from the ex- 
action of private monopoly is to diminish the profits of the 
monopolists. They will not submit to this without a struggle 
and however sincere the attempt may be to accomplish it, or- 
ganized wealth wields too many weapons to make the perma- 
nent success of such an undertaking much more probable than 
that of achieving artificial competition. Not only can organ- 
ized wealth, through its representatives in Congress, delay the 
passage of any act adverse to its interests, but it can have in- 
corporated in such acts various ingenious provisions which 
make their evasion easy, or other acts may be passed making 
them unenforcible. Even if it is successful in passing the legis- 
lative stage unmutilated, means may be found for causing the 
prosecuting officers to suspend their activities, and if this fails, 
the thousand technicalities of judicial procedure for delay and 
evasion are still available. By the time these difficulties have 
been surmounted the monopolies may have changed their form, 
reverted to the secret pooling stage, making the act inapplicable, 
or devised some new method of evasion. But even if they fail 
in all attempts at evasion what eternal vigilance will it require 
to keep them under control. Publicity of all their transactions 
will be an essential feature of government control. To insure 
accuracy in the reports of these transactions in the case of 
several hundred monopolies is in itself no small undertaking. 
The myriad modes known to bookkeeping of concealing profits 
under other names must all be understood and met, and this by 
men whose temptation to opacity of understanding may be made 
very great by the interested parties. But let us assume that all 
these and many other difficulties are surmounted, in what a 
dangerous position will the government find itself, surrounded 
by these colossi of capitalism whose interests are in eternal 
antagonism to that of the people. Will they forever submit 
tamely to regulation? Will the government control the mo- 
nopolies or will the monopolies control the government ? Judg- 
ing by their present hold upon various departments of govern- 
ment the latter alternative appears at least plausible. In a 
land where a double standard of honor exists — a personal and 
a political standard — the people cannot hope for much from 
their representatives when subjected to temptation to conduct, 
not judged publicly or privately by the personal standard. 
They will not accord more than the people expect, and so long 
as the people expect politics to be "practical/' they will not 
be disappointed. So long as they condone corruption they will 



THE POLITICS OF TTILITY 

find those willing to have it condoned. It is not more the 
people's representatives than their own blindness which betrays 
them. 

But again^ let us assume that all difficulties in government 
regulation of monopolies, without corruption, are surmounted, 
and that the monopolists are completely submissive to the 
people's will, Beeking no advantage not freely accorded them — 
what has been accomplished? If regulation is to relieve the 
people of exaction, at least one of the results must he the re- 
striction of profits to some specific maximum — to a fair rate, 
whatever thai mystic figure may be — say 7% on the actual 
capital invested — a rate frequently set in the franchises of 
street railway companies. A result such as this would undeni- 
ably be of benefit to the people and relieve them of much ex- 
action ; but what effect would it have upon improvement in the 
arts — that much vaunted advantage of the capitalistic system 
— that benefit to mankind for the sake of which, we are told, 
the community may well ignore all the evils of the system? 
Competition being abolished, the hope of increased profit being 
abolished, what incentive is there to the capitalist to promote 
improvement in the arts? He has nothing to gain from it — 
any increase of profit which might accrue will be confiscated by 
the community. His interest is confined to keeping his profits 
from falling below the maximum allowed him. If they threaten 
to fall he can check the tendency more easily by oppressing his 
employees or by producing an inferior product than by the 
expensive operation of junking old machinery and installing a 
new and improved type. Thus, even if the people succeed in 
regulating monopoly they will at the same time have deprived 
the capitalistic system of its only excuse for existence — of its 
one beneficent effect upon the elements of happiness. What 
the capitalist apologist to say to this dilemma? Can it be 
a delusion? Is beneficence indeed so inseparable from capital- 
ism that it survives every mutation? Is it the inevitable prod- 
uct of competition, and the no less inevitable product of the 
absence of competition? Doubtless our economists will be able 
in -nme manner to show that it is. To the dogmatist, eternal 
ingenuity is the price of consistency. 

When the stage of pseudo-socialism has been reached in an 
industrial community the capitalistic system is in extremis. 
The attempt to support the collapsing structure is doomed to 
failure. No sooner is one portion strengthened by a statutory 
prop or brace than another portion gives way. Law is piled on 



PRIVATE AND PUBLIC MONOPOLY 63 

law, regulation on regulation, in a vain attempt to rehabilitate 
a piece of industrial and political junk by the mere force of 
overlegislation. In fact, government control with retention of 
capitalism is — like the attempt at artificial competition — a 
kind of political quackery. It is a thing of laissez faire shreds 
and legislative patches and cannot endure. It will either de- 
velop into a condition of consistent public monopoly, or of con- 
sistent private monopoly in w T hich government control is a mere 
form. If the nation does not own the monopolies, the monop- 
olies will own the nation. 

But if government control of monopoly with retention of cap- 
italism involves the permanent evils we have mentioned, w r ould 
they or their equivalents be involved in government control 
without retention of capitalism? Is public monopoly better 
than public control of private monopoly ? Those who claim that 
it is are called socialists, and their doctrine socialism. Socialism 
requires that all socialized means of production shall be owned 
by society, and not by individuals. Ownership is but one form 
of control. Is it better that the people should control their own 
industries, or simply share in their control ? And if they should 
share in control, by what principle of economics are we to dis- 
cover the degree in which they should be permitted to share? 
Government regulation, of course, outlaws the laissez faire 
theory. If now w r e reject socialism by what principle shall we 
be guided? Economists can, of course, supply none, but they 
can reject socialism. Consistency requires that they shall, because 
for years they have been frightening the public with the threat 
of socialism, just as nurses sometimes frighten children with 
tales of the bogey-man. If we examine current newspaper criti- 
cism of socialism it w r ill appear that it seldom gets beyond the 
name. To say that a proposal is " socialistic " is to condemn it. 
It seems to be a word, not a doctrine, to which objection is made. 
In his polemics against socialism the average editor opposes not 
a political theory, but a mode of spelling. Indeed, the only con- 
sistent opponent of socialism is the anarchist or the oligarchist. 
Socialism is but consistent democracy. It is democracy applied 
to all forms of conduct which affect the interests of society 
instead of to a few traditional forms only. 

The government of a nation is a means of attaining certain 
proximate ends. By definition, therefore, it is a means of pro- 
duction. The oligarchist claims that this means of production 
should be in private hands. The democrat claims that it should 
be in public hands. During feudal times, those archaic capital- 



C4 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

ists the seigniorial lords competed for its possession. The 
monarchies rounded by the conquerors among these competitors 
displaced competition with private monopoly. The replace- 
ment of a monarchy by a republic is the substitution of public 
for private monopoly. In the United States this was accom- 
plished at one stroke by the Eevolution. In Europe it has 
come about — or rather is coming about — through a series of 
compromises between public and private monopoly. That is, 
the people do not control the government, but merely share in 
its control — in some cases more — in others less. The demo- 
crat claims that as the government of a nation should be man- 
aged in the public interest it should be controlled by the public. 
Otherwise it will be managed— not in the public interest, 
but in the interest of those who control it — and experience 
confirms the claim. The oligarchist denies the claim, and ap- 
peals to custom to sustain his position. The socialist claims 
that as the industries of a nation should be managed in the 
public interest, they should be controlled by the public. Other- 
wise they will be managed — not in the public interest, but in 
the interest of those who control them — and experience con- 
firms the claim. The dogmatic economist denies the claim and 
appeals to custom to sustain his position. The socialist claims 
that all such means of production should be in the hands of 
the public — his opponent claims that only those which it is 
customary to have in public hands should be placed there. 

The position of the utilitarian on this question, as on all 
questions, is, of course, determined strictly by utility. When 
(•.impel it ion is more useful than other proposed policies, adopt 
it ; when private monopoly is more useful adopt that; when 
public monopoly is more useful, then adopt that. Does this 
simple course appear reasonable? I believe it will so appear. 
Very well then. Socialism is entitled to be judged on its 
rits and not on its spelling. We have examined seriatim the 
alleged advantages of competition. Briefly we have pointed out 
■ modification- introduced by the system now commonly pro- 
sed, viz., pseudo-socialism, or private monopoly under public 
control. Lei us now see what is claimed for public monopoly. 

ialism proposes to abolish the individual capitalist work- 
ing in his own interest, and substitute for him the nation 
rking in its own interest. When by the suppression of the 
firsl two classes of competition (p. 11) private monopoly has 
n attained, the socialisl proposes to suppress tin 4 second two 
cla '. Instead of perpetuating the antagonism between 



PKIVATE AND PUBLIC MONOPOLY 65 

vested interests and public interests, and then attempting to 
restrain and check it by a complex regulating mechanism he 
proposes to abolish the antagonism, and thus dispense with the 
necessity of restraint. Instead of a system whereby the people 
sell their labor to a capitalist and then buy back the product of 
that labor from the capitalist, leaving at each transaction a 
margin of profit in his hands, the socialist proposes that the 
nation shall labor for itself, and buy from itself, all profit 
accruing to the nation. Thus the antagonism between buyer 
and seller, between laborer and employer of labor, is abolished, 
for the nation is both buyer and seller, both laborer and em- 
ployer of labor. Through ownership of the means of production 
the nation becomes its own capitalist. In effect, the advantage 
claimed for this system is its improvement in the economy of 
consumption. By its abolition of the competitive system it 
abolishes the unequal distribution of wealth which characterizes 
that system. Inequality in the distribution of wealth is merely 
inequality in the opportunity possessed by individuals of availing 
themselves of their own labor. The rich man has an advantage 
over the poor man simply because the first can avail himself 
of more labor than he performs, the second of less labor than 
he performs, provided we measure labor by its cost. In pur- 
chasing commodities we avail ourselves of the labor involved in 
their production. He who can purchase commodities of the 
highest labor cost therefore, can avail himself of the most labor. 
Capitalists do not employ laborers merely to satisfy a whim — 
they employ them that they may avail themselves of a portion 
of their labor — as large a portion as possible. To this portion 
Marx has given the name " surplus labor ; " it appears in the 
profit of the capitalist. Now, as equality in the distribution of 
wealth promotes utility, equality should be sought, and the 
socialist claims that the shortest way to achieve it is to abolish 
profit and to make, on the average, each individual able to 
avail himself of his own labor and no more; or, rather, as 
children and other helpless persons, for obvious reasons, either 
cannot or should not be laborers, to make each normal family 
able to avail themselves of their own labor and no more, i. e., 
to make them self-sufficient. This is the object of socialism. 

Inequality of distribution in wealth is, of course, one of the 
chief defects of the capitalistic system; hence any device which 
promises to remedy it is worth considering. The question is — 
Does socialism, in diminishing one defect, increase others? Its 



CG THE POLITICS OF ITILITY 

opponents claim that it does, and in this country their real 
criticisms are practically confined to thi 
The firel is thai socialism would lead to widespread corrup- 
Government in America is certainly corrupt, and if 
ruptioo is ed to the operations of the government this is a 

as criticism. General corruption would not only i 
genera] demoralization of character, but it would impair the 

iency of production everywhere. It is, however, generally 
acknowledged that the demoralized condition of the government 
is duo to the influence of capitalism. The transfer of the 

: business standards of morality fostered by the competitive 

m into politics brings politics down to the level of busi- 
In fact, in our country, politics is a kind of business and 
is pursued for profit. The control of legislative bodies and 
other departments of government by great business interests is 
notorious. This is the source of all the grand corruption to be 
found in the government, and this socialism would abolish by 
the destruction of capitalism. As to petty corruption, that is 
fully as prevalent in great corporation- as it is in the govern- 
ment service. Rebates, commissions, rake-offs, and jobs of every 

ription, are so common in business transactions as nol to 
cause comment ; and when we consider the gigantic operations 
of "frenzied finance,"* speculation, stock watering, cornering, 
corporation-wrecking, fraudulent bankruptcy, embezzlement, 
and every form of stock-jobbery, the petty stealings of subordi- 
nate governmenl officials which occasionally occur, sink into in- 
significance. In the abolition of capitalism, socialism would 
abolish thousands of times the corruption it would cause. 
Professor Parsons of Boston University states the case with 
brevity thus : 

u The causes and conditions of corruption are mainly (1), pri- 
vate monopoly; (2), political influence in appointment, and ( :> >); 
'■>*• 

" Private ownership of public utilities leaves all three ca 
in full bloom and feeds their roots. 

"Public ownership eliminates two ^f the causes — private mo- 
nopoly and secrecy — and if established under reasonable civil 
service regulations it eliminates the other cause also." 

Tn fact, it ie difficult for an impartial observer to take 
seriously such a criticism as this one of socialism. It is, indeed, 
a Btrong, and not a weak feature of the socialistic doctrine that 
is hero criticized. Public monopoly offers a remedy for the 



PKIVATE AND PUBLIC MONOPOLY 67 

present capitalistic control of the government which regulated 
private monopoly does not offer. To license private monopolies 
while leaving them the incentive and the power to corrupt those 
who are employed by the people to supervise their operations is 
to invite disaster. The simplest common sense is all that is 
required to dispose of this first objection to socialism. 

The second objection is that control of the means of produc- 
tion by the nation would put in the hands of the party in 
power a political machine so strong as to be detrimental to the 
interests of the community. Those who offer this objection 
have in mind the capitalistic method of influencing elections. 
They can only mean that it would put in the hands of a machine 
the power of defeating the will of the majority. The opposi- 
tion of parties, when it is real, is generally an opposition be- 
tween classes whose interests are antagonistic. The abolition of 
capitalism would abolish any marked distinction of the people 
into antagonistic classes, and it is the claim of socialists that, 
with the disappearance of class antagonism, party antagonism 
will disappear, the interests of the whole people being the same. 
It is the aim of socialism, as of less consistent democracy, to do 
away with all class distinctions save those established by nature 
herself. In the absence of the corruption caused by capitalism 
it is difficult to see how public monopoly could result in the 
defeat of the will of the majority, particularly when by the 
abolition of classes the majority would be practically the whole 
people. 

The third objection is one which critics of socialism are 
unanimous in urging. The claim is made that whatever gain 
socialism might effect in the efficiency of consumption would be 
more than offset by the loss in efficiency of production due to 
the abolition of the class whose zeal to improve the arts is 
directly due to their self-interest. In a state which is its own 
capitalist the incentive to the introduction of labor-saving 
machinery, including skilful organization and management, dis- 
cussed on page 24, will be lacking. It is justly urged that if 
mankind is to produce a surplus of happiness, means must be 
discovered of producing desiderata at a less cost of labor than at 
present, for it is doubtless true that not only is the distribution 
of wealth at the present day bad, but the amount of wealth per 
capita is, and always has been, inadequate. Hence, if socialism 
does, as a matter of fact, check improvement in the art and 
organization of industry, and while improving the distribution 



i 3 1 III-: POLITICS OF rTTTTJTV 

of wealth diminishes the amount per capita — a valid objection 
has !»''• : tinsl it. 

Many facts appear to bear out this criticism of socialism. Tn 
America it appears to be a genera] rule that enterprises carried 
<»n 1»\ are expensive. It appears to cost the 

>vernmen1 more to accomplish any given amount of production 
than it does private parties. Such facts lose much of their 
force, however, when we recall that efficiency of production is 
inversely proportional, not to money cost, but to labor o< 
The confusion of these two things, bo common in our day. is a 
heritage from the obsolete mercantile system. We cannot infer 
from money cost to labor cost, a- they are by no means propor- 

i- one another. The incentive of the capitalist is to 
due si — labor cost is a matter of indifference to him. 

Bence it will he found that the private individual deriv< - 
of his advantage over the government from the cheaper and 
more oppressed labor that he en. ploys. The government has 
no incentive to oppress its employees, since it seeks no pp 
from their Burplus labor. Bence the money cost of govern- 
mental production, as a rule, ranges higher than that carried on 
by private capitalists, but tin 1 labor cost is not, therefore, ncc 
sarily higher. 

\;m strides in mechanical improvements made by in- 
dustries in private hands is often adduced as evidence of the 
effectiveness of the incentive to capitalists to improve the art-, 
and yet what art lias advanced so rapidly in the last generation 

art of warfare — an art which has no part in the busin 

of private individuals and which has been developed without 

the incentive of the capitalist to profit. A modern war vessel 

►ne of the most complex and ingenious machines of modern 

and it has been developed by the government for its own 

purp 

Bui if governmental administration is so unsatisfactory, why 
it ii is continually encroaching on the held of private 
. and this in Bpite of the powerful opposition of cap- 
italism. It is significant that, with a few trifling exceptions in 
of municipal governments, the assumption by the gov- 
ernment of any activity is always permanent. It holds all the 
Mid if and do one proposes the re-substitution of 

enterprise. Does any one suggest placing or replacing 
public buildings, the post-office , the light- 

. the life-saving service, the service of the agricul- 
tural department, or the geodetic survey, in private hands 



PKIVATE AND PUBLIC MONOPOLY 69 

They are no more public services than the administration of the 
railroads, the telegraphs, the iron mines, or the flour mills of 
the country. It would be perfectly possible for the government 
to turn them over to private parties. Why, if the government 
is so lax, is this not done or at least proposed? Does any one 
suppose that if the government once assumed control of the 
railroads, the coal mines, the steel works, or any other public 
utility, that there would be any national demand for their re- 
turn to the control of capitalists? If so, it would be a com- 
plete reversal of all former experiences. No: the first two 
forms of competition when once abolished are abolished per- 
manently, and the same will be true of the last tw r o. In this 
country there has been little opportunity to compare govern- 
mental with capitalistic efficiency, but when we examine the 
experience of other countries we are confirmed in the view that 
any great activity once undertaken by the government is found 
so much more satisfactory than the same activity in private 
hands, that no one proposes to return. To this statement there 
are relatively few exceptions. In New Zealand the success of 
public monopoly has been so pronounced that a general knowl- 
edge of its benefits is probably all that would be required to 
cause the United States to adopt a similar policy. 1 What is 
true of New Zealand is true elsewhere. In Europe practical 
socialism is advancing rapidly, and even in our own backward 
country the advantage of public over private enterprises is 
generally recognized by candid observers. Governor Douglas, 
of Massachusetts, in his inaugural address, remarks : 

"Whatever doubts may exist as to the expediency of State or 
Federal ownership of public utilities, the operation of such under- 
takings has now passed the experimental stage. It has been 
demonstrated by the experience of towns and cities in this Com- 
monwealth, both with regard to water supply and public lighting, 
that under favorable conditions and proper management the busi- 
ness of gas, electric lighting, and water supply can be conducted 
by municipal corporations with profit to the inhabitants, both in 
price and service." 

" It is not disputed that as a rule, private corporations conduct 
their business more economically than do public corporations. It 
is, however, disputed that the public usually obtains the benefit 
of this economical management. In most cases, therefore, the 

i An excellent discussion and comparison of the industrial system of 
New Zealand and the United States is that of H. H. Lusk in " Our Foes 
at Home." 1899. 



70 THE politics OF l"l \\M\ 

publicly owned and operated water* and electric 

lighting plants have given the public cheaper and I nrvioa 

than have the privately owned concerns." 

Whal 18 true of water works and gas plants and mean- 
transportation, is equally true of any and every public utility. 
T principle thai activities carried on in the public in1 
Id I"* controlled by the public is as generally sound as any 
• political principle, and it is the only justification of 
icy. When the effects of national policies an* estimated 
in units of happiness, instead of units of money, confusion on 
subjed will largely disappear. 
\ r arc public utilities limited to those enterprise- to which 
the public, through its government, grants a charter or fran- 
chise. In a primitive condition of BOciety, when each fam- 
ily produced what it consumed and consumed what it pro- 
duced, public utilities did not exist. But as soon as the div 
of labor, and with it the system of exchange arose, public utilities 
came into being, since the mode of operation of producers no 
longer concerned themselves alone. In early times each family 
was a self-sufficing unit, and was independent of other units. 
To-day each family should be a self-sufficing unit, hut it should 
not be, and cannot he, independent of others. It cannot pro- 
duce exactly what it consumes, hut it can, and should, produce 
the equivalent of what it consumes, and by the modern Bystem 
of industry it can make a given amount of labor indefinitely 
more effective than under the old system of self-sufficiency. 
This L r ain in efficiency, however, converts all industries into 
public utilities, since each family is no longer dependent for its 
desiderata upon it< own activities, hut is dependent upon others. 
- public IS entitled to lite, liberty and the pursuit of happi- 
only l>y sufferance of those private persons or corporations 
who produce the desiderata which the public consumes, then, 
!, an oligarchy of industry exists, more unjust than the 
military oligarchies of ancient times. To claim, as some 
writers do, that the public are entitled to control only those 
industries which operate under a franchise is to found public 
conduct upon a purely arbitrary distinction. Public utilities 
nrr those whose operation affects the interests of the public and it 
is en this account, and on this account alone, that the public are 
entitled to control them. If democracy requires that conduct af- 
fecting the interests of shall he controlled by society 
(p. 3), then the public control of public utilities i- the only 






PRIVATE AND PUBLIC MONOPOLY 71 

course of conduct consistent with democracy. Capitalism, indeed, 
is but the form of oligarchy which the application of the scientific 
method to production alone, happens to generate. Though in 
form it may be democratic, in substance it is as far removed 
from democracy as the true monarchies of Europe or Asia. 

Assuming that the third objection to public monopoly is 
valid — it is no less valid as an objection to publicly controlled 
private monopoly. If socialism withdraws the existing incen- 
tive to improve the arts without supplying any other, the same 
may be said of pseudo-socialism, which has all the disadvantages 
of socialism, and most of those of competition, without the ad- 
vantage of socialism in promoting efficiency of consumption, 
nor that of competition in promoting efficiency of production. 
He who would condemn genuine socialism on these grounds 
must doubly condemn the pseudo-socialism which the leaders of 
public opinion in America are now proposing as a substitute 
therefor. 

Besides those we have considered, there are five popular criti- 
cisms of socialism which arise from a misunderstanding of its 
tenets. 

First. There is a very common confusion of socialism 
with anarchism. This implies gross ignorance since the two 
schools are antithetical, the first advocating more government, 
the second less. Anarchism is simply consistent laissez faire 
doctrine, and is the purest individualism, whereas socialism is 
anti-individualistic. A point of resemblance between these op- 
posite schools may, nevertheless, be. detected. Anarchism would 
abolish law, because it interferes with " individual liberty " so- 
called. Socialism proposes to abolish it by dispensing with the 
necessity for it. It is the claim of socialists that by abolishing 
the division of society into antagonistic classes, and raising the 
whole population to a standard of living and morals such that 
all will have a stake in the order and well-being of society, that 
crime will dwindle and tend to disappear, that courts, prisons, 
and police, will become superfluous, and that the conscience of 
the community will take the place of law. This expectation is 
not without foundation, since it is from the desire for profit, 
the antagonism of classes, and the ignorance and poverty which 
are the universal concomitants of capitalism, that most of the 
crimes of the community arise. 

Second. There is frequent confusion of socialism with com- 
munism. The latter embodies the doctrine of community of 
goods — the principle of dividing the wealth of a community so 



72 THE POLITICS OF U 1 11. II V 






that each member has the Bame Bhare. Althouj alism, hv 

ncy to equalize the distribution <»(' wealth, tern 
complish a result resembling that of communism, it imj 
upon do one any obligation not already imposed, to divide hia 

th with other members of the community. Within 
limits as ar<' prescribed by the principle of self-sufficiency — 
each self-sufficing unit may consume the equivalen 
• it produces — socialism permits of tin 1 accumulatioi 
wealth to any extenl whatever. It involves no principle of 
"dividing up" irrespective of the industry or indolence, 
capacity or incapacity, of individuals. 

WCrc it indeed true thai socialism put a premium upon in- 
ace, and forced the industrious to support the idle, it would 
show that socialism had a distinct resemblance to capitalism, 
but it is nol true, though perhaps the mistake is a natural one, 
since some socialists have advocated a policy which would 
result in such a condition. I refer to those who claim that 
justice requires a distribution of wealth according to the need for 
it. Were this a practical policy it would be a just one; but 
with human beings as they are it is inoperative, since to dis- 
■•• desiderata according as persons need or do not Deed 
them would put a premium upon the cultivation of need-, or of 
requirements which would he accepted as needs. Hence those 
who most dissipated their resources would receive the most 
from society. Such a policy would develop more requirements 
than could he supplied, and soon prove suicidal. In other words, 
a policy of distribution according to i\c(^\> is, like competition, 
a maleficently accelerative policy, and is not adapted to its 
end. During the last century it was embodied in the poor laws 
of England and stimulated pauperism so fasl that it had to he 
abandoned. The policy is only practical when restricted to 
>ns who are incapacitated. It has no relation to socialism. 
Third. There is a very widespread misapprehension that 
socialism would diminish the liberty of individuals, and force 
one to adopt a cut-and-dried mode of life, having no rela- 
tion to their tastes and aspirations. This notion arises from 
assumption that socialism in production implies socialism in 
consumption. No such implication is justified. Indeed, one 
ijects of socialism is to increase the real liberty of the 
individual by abolishing as far as possible that individualism 
in production which is bo notoriously inefficient; thereby free- 
ing his life sufficiently from the necessity of labor to enable him 
to increase the duration of consumption. Socialism in con- 



PKIVATE AND PUBLIC MONOPOLY 73 

sumption would be as inefficient as individualism in production, 
and neither policy is consistent with economy in the generation 
of happiness. 

Fourth. There is a popular notion that socialism is destruc- 
tive of the family and is opposed to the institution of marriage. 
It is obvious that public ownership of the means of production, 
which is all that socialism involves, can have no relation to such 
a matter as this. Socialism includes no peculiar views on mar- 
riage, though doubtless some socialists may hold such views; but 
if so, it is a mere coincidence, just as some socialists may be 
bow-legged or cross-eyed. Capitalism, indeed, is much more 
destructive of the family than socialism. Child-labor would 
not be tolerated under the latter system, and the employment 
of women would be much restricted, whereas under capitalism, 
unrestrained by the state, women and children are drafted into 
the ranks of labor and made to grind out their lives in toil that 
commerce may flourish and profits increase. It was this evil 
that brought about the enactment of the Factory Acts — those 
earliest offspring of socialism. 

Fifth. Another popular idea associates socialism with 
atheism and the destruction of religion. There is, of course, 
no such connection. To place public utilities in the control of 
the public would no more tend to promote irreligion than to 
place the Post Office in the control of private parties would 
tend to promote religion. 

I have not deemed it necessary to examine seriatum the effects 
upon the elements of happiness of the social mechanisms em- 
bodied either in artificial competition, pseudo-socialism or 
socialism. All these are attempts to improve modern capitalism, 
and are directed primarily to remedying its most conspicuous 
defect — inequality in the distribution of wealth. The first 
two, even if adapted to their end — which they are not — would 
ignore seven of the eight elements of happiness. All we can 
say of them is that, as improvements upon the present system, 
they are the first which would suggest themselves to minds 
trained in the dogmas of the prevailing school and yet forced 
to acknowledge the inadequacy of those dogmas to deal with 
modern problems. They are feeble compromises between 
anarchism and socialism and not consistent with themselves. 
As intermediate stages in progress toward a scientific system it 
is to the interest of the public to make them as short as possible. 
These intermediate stages always occur in the transition from 
dogma to common sense; hence the present trend of politics is 



74 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

quite normal, as the history of the inductive sciences amply 
illustrate 

As t" socialism, though it is Founded upon a sound principle 
— the same principle indeed, upon which democracy itself is 
founded — it has not, at present, sufficient definiteness to permit 
of a systematic test by means of the elements of happiness. It 
groping effort after a better state, and necessarily groping, 
since it does not -tart out with a definite recognition of what it 
is supposed to accomplish. Hence it ignores almosl as many 
of the elements of happiness a- artificial competition and 
icialism. Nevertheless it is a step in the right direc- 
tion, and upon its foundation principle that those things which 
ail'eet tiie happiness of the whole people should be controlled 
by the whole people, I -hall attempt to build a mechanism 
adapted to the end of utility. In this attempt I shall con- 
struct not an indefinite, hut a definite, system, capable as far as 
any system buiH on paper can he, of test by the criteria laid 
down in Chapter 8. 1 I do not claim that the system to b< 
pounded in the chapter following is the only common sens* 
tern: I claim that it is a common sense system; to be promptly 
ignored and discarded if a better one may he proposed. 

i Of l'li«' Economy of Happiness. 



CHAPTEK IV 

PANTO CRACY 

In discussing the third objection to socialism in the pre- 
ceding chapter we have discovered a valid criticism of all 
systems which have thus far been proposed for the guidance of 
society. To cure poverty and to make the average individual 
self-supporting, a better distribution of wealth is a necessary, 
but not a sufficient, condition. A greater rate of consumption 
per capita is essential and the only means of attaining it is to 
make greater the rate of production per capita. We shall point 
out later that the population of a community is entirely beyond 
human control when the consumptive rate is of low value, and 
hence cannot be brought to beneficent equilibrium. The first 
essential then of an economic system is to simultaneously raise 
the efficiency of production and of consumption. Capitalism, 
whether competitive or monopolistic, admits of no means of ac- 
complishing such a result. Socialism does. I propose, then, 
to undertake the exposition of a. modification of socialism 
which will presumably combine all the advantages of public 
monopoly with the single advantage of competition, at the 
same time augmenting that single advantage in a degree im- 
possible under competition. To understand the relation of this 
proposed system to that at present in operation a slight analysis 
of profit wiL be necessary. 

Profit under the present system accomplishes two and only 
two useful objects. (1) It induces men to undertake the pro- 
duction of desiderata: (2) It induces them to undertake to 
improve the means of production. Economists claim no other 
element of utility in profit. Aside from these two objects the 
incentive furnished by profit, or the hope of profit, is not an 
incentive to useful acts, but to harmful ones. Under the 
wage system the recompense of the laborer for his labor is his 
wages — of the capitalist for his capital is his profit. The 
capitalist will not permit his capital to be utilized in the pro- 
duction of commodities without the promise of profit — hence, 
under the present system of private capital, profit is essential, 

75 



76 I HE POLITICS OF tJTIU I Y 

since without it capitalists would not engage, or permit their 
capital to engage, m production at all. since they would have 
no motive to do bo. This first object of profit, socialism ac- 
complishes without the necessity of profit by making produc- 
tion a regular and customary Function of government. Under 
[ism all kinds of industries would be undertaken as regular 
departments of government, and would ho earned on just as the 
military or naval establishments, the geological survey, or the 
Office department are carried on, without the necessity of, 
or incentive to, profit. Eence socialism, as it is, would accom- 
plish the first object of profit. 

A- t<> the second object of profit, all systems propo-ed or 
practised are hut lame substitutes lor a systematic application 
of common sense. We have cited reasons for believing that 
the popular opinion which holds socialism inferior to com- 
petition in the attainment of this end is. in considerable measure, 
a delusion, hut whether this he so or not, nothing can he done 
with competition to improve it in this respect, since its supreme 
virtue becomes manifest only when "let alone. " Socialism, on 
the 4 other hand, has no such limitation, and admits of any im- 
provements which common sense may suggest. Its doctrines, 
therefore, afford a foundation for an applied technology of 
happiness. 

The first question before us is, how may the efficiency of pro- 
duction he increased simultaneously with an increase in the 
efficiency of consumption? The profit of the capitalist is sup- 
posed by the laissez faire theorists to he a means of inducing 
him to accomplish the first half of this service for society, hut 
we have -eon how ill he accomplishes it. Nevertheless, is it not 
possible to obtain from the capitalistic system one valuable BUg- 
OU — to extract from it one feature — which, when ap- 
plied to socialism, remedies its worst defect, and at the sume 
time Leaves capitalism without a single point of superiority, 
real or imaginary? Could society contrive a method of simul- 
taneously stimulating in a high degree the efficiency of both 
production and consumption it would certainly be worth paying 
for — it would he worth much sacrifice — indeed, if poverty is 
to ho permanently cured, and the total activities of society placed 
upon n self-supporting basis, some method of achieving this 
result must he devised. It is not only desirable — it is essential. 
If the stimulus of profit under the capitalistic system fails, as 
rtainly doe-, why can we not adapt the same stimulus to 
socialistic system so a- to succeed? Why can we not harness 



PANTOCRACY 77 

the power of individual self-interest to the mechanism of public 
monopoly so as to drive it with all the speed of which that power 

pable toward the goal of all human endeavor — happic 
Now, there is reason to believe that precisely this thing can be 
done — that society, through organization, can be converted into 
a great happiness-producing mechanism, and that self-inter--', 
can be utilized to drive it. Thus we shall not have to essay the 
hopeless task of destroying egotism in men, but simply by divert- 
ing its channel from competition to co-operation convert it into 
a mighty power for the good — instead of the harm — of man- 
kind. To destroy human egotism is impossible. Therefore let 
us direct it so as to make it serve the ends of society instead 
of subverting them. To the construction of such a happiness 
engine I propose to devote the remainder of this work. With 
the material at present available it will, of necessity, be very im- 
perfect — a rude and clumsy affair with many of the details 
lacking — to be compared with the early efforts of Newcomen 
or Watt to construct a steam engine. But perhaps in the future 
from this crude beginning a structure may be developed which 
will bear the same relation to the original that a modern marine 
engine bears to jSTewcomen's atmospheric engine of 1705. Pos- 
sibly such a hope is delusive and such a comparison presump- 
tuous. But this much is certain — to produce the maximum 
output of happiness society must be organized into a happiness- 
producing mechanism — and to drive it no less powerful an 
agent will be required than the one permanent force inherent 
in human nature — self-interest. 

That such a mechanism is constructible may be inferred from 
two propositons whose soundness has been established in the 
discussion of the second factor of happiness: (1) The rate of 
production per capita can he increased — therefore the rate of 
consumption per capita can be increased. (2) The time re- 
quired for a given amount of production can be decreased — 
therefore the time occupied in consumption can be increased. 
With these two inferences assuring the soundness of our theory, 
and with the analysis of the factors of happiness into their 
elements as our guide to its application, we may proceed to our 
task with confidence that we are on solid ground. At least we 
know definitely what we desire to accomplish, and that it is 
theoretically accomplishable. The only question which remains 
is: Have we the ingenuity to devise a mechanism, however crude, 
for its accomplishment? A similar situation confronted those 
who first undertook the construction of the steam engine, and 



7^ THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

we shall endeavor to profit by their example. At this point I 
shall make no attempt to show how the mechanism proposed may 
he substituted for the one at present in operation, deeming it 
besl to postpone the discussion of that matter to the following 
chapter. 

The mechanism I propose has eight different features, ami 
may conveniently be expounded in eight section-, concerned 
with the following topics: 

( 1 ) Public ownership of the means of production. Retention 
of the wage system and abolition of profit. 

(2) Organization of a system of distribution, whereby supply 
of. and demand for, products may be adjusted. 

Organization of a national labor exchange, whereby supply 
<if, and demand for, labor may be adjusted. 

(-1) Organization of an inspection system, whereby the quality 
of products may be maintained at a definite standard. 

(5) Application of labor to production. 

(6) Organization of invention. 

(7) Old age insurance. 

< 8 ) Reform of education. 

The system to be elucidated under these eight headings I 
shall call pantocracy ((Jr. -n-av = all : Kparim = to rule), because 
it involves the control of human activities in the interest of all. 

S iion (1) The foundation of pantocracy is simply the 

ialism of Marx and his co-workers. All industries capable 
of being converted into monopolies are so converted, and title 
to the means of production appertaining thereto vested in the 
government — that is, in the people — the government being 
merely their instrument; local industries, of course, to be 
owned by local governments, national industries by the national 

rernment. Capitalists in control of those industries capable 
of being converted into monopolies (and they include practically 
all important industries) are dispensed with, the nation acting 

its own capitalist. With this change, profit is abolished, and 
can be converted entirely into wages, the wage system being 
retained. The system of socialism is so well known as to re- 
quire no discussion here. It has been tried and not found 
wanting. The Posl Office department is an example of its ap- 
plication to a national industry formerly in the hands of private 
parties, [ildeed every department of government is an example 

applied socialism. Even the army and navy might be placed 

in private hands, and trusted to private benevolence, and were 



PANTOCEACY 79 

the laissez faire economists consistent, they would advocate such 
a policy. Socialism began with democratic government. 

Section (2) It has been shown in a former chapter that real 
liberty increases as liberty to consume increases. But real lib- 
erty is proportional to opportunity for happiness, and as hap- 
piness will, in general, be proportional to the opportunity for it, 
an economic system should stimulate the liberty to consume as 
much as possible. Now the demand, or what economists call 
the effective demand is proportional to real, not to legal, liberty. 
The man who gets $5.00 a week wage may have as much legal 
liberty as he who gets $50.00, but he has not, in general, as 
much real liberty, and his effective demand is less. Demand, 
however, can lead to consumption only if it is supplied. Pro- 
duction is necessary to consumption, and in a common sense 
system it is essential that the demand for, and supply of, 
desiderata be adjusted to one another. We have seen how com- 
petition accomplishes this — or rather fails to accomplish it — 
resulting in all sorts of unnecessary labor, reduplication of 
plants, failures, enforced idleness, and crises, with their at- 
tendant ills. Private monopoly does better. A monopoly like 
the Standard Oil Company has main distributing agencies scat- 
tered throughout the territory it supplies; each of these has 
branch agencies and there is an organized system of distribution. 
Eeports of the demand from these various agencies are re- 
ceived regularly by persons whose function it is to regulate the 
supply by the demand. If the demand slackens, the supply is 
made to slacken; if the demand accelerates, the supply is ac- 
celerated. Thus production is adapted to consumption, there is 
no overproduction, and one result of competitive chaos is elimi- 
nated. Private monopoly has no tendency to equality of dis- 
tribution in demand, whereby the demand would become a real 
index of happiness output, but so far as it goes it accomplishes 
an excellent result — it adjusts supply to demand, and this 
feature of private monopoly should be adopted by public 
monopoly. 

The output of every industry should be controlled by an 
organized department called the Department of Output Regular 
tion. This department should be in communication with a 
national system of warehouses or distributing agencies. Its sole 
function should be to keep records of the stock on hand of all 
commodities in all distributing agencies, and the rate at which 
they are being distributed in supplying the demand. Through 
the knowledge thus recorded it should regulate the rate of pro- 



SO THE POLITICS OF ri'IUTY 

duct inn in each industry, keeping it in constant adjustment to 
consumption. Each month, or quarter, it should call 
definite output from the plant- of the nation, and just that out- 
put, and do more, should I"' supplied. Obviously, a stock suffi- 
cienl to supply the demand for several months in advance should 
always be kept on hand — a policy pursued by every prudent 
storekeeper, and essential to the prompt filling of orders. In 
c$se of Decessities this reserve stock Bhould be greater than 
in tb of other commodities, except, of course, in the case 

o\' perishable commodities, for which an adapted system of dis- 
tribution should be provided. 

A single Distributing Department Bhould be organized whose 
function should he to distribute the output of the plants of the 
country to the various distributing stations. Such an organ- 
ized department would save a vast amount of unnecessary labor 
and duplication of effort. It should be operated on the same 
principle as a commodity producing industry (See section 5) 
and possess a completely independent organization. Both the 
department of output regulation and that of distribution should, 
of course, be divided into subordinate divisions, corresponding 
to the various departments into which the industries of the 
country are divided; ami the organization should he such that 
delay- and interruptions are reduced to a minimum. An or- 
ganized system of regulation, such as described, could regulate 
the supply of practically all commodities to the demand for 
them, just as the Post Office department regulates the supply 
imps, postal card-, stamped envelopes, new-paper wrappers, 
etc. to the demand for them, in all the sixty-odd thousand postal 
distributing stations throughout the United States. 

8 fciou (3) So long a- men are not at liberty to perpetu- 
ally consume — so long as they must produce — it is desir- 
able that they should be at liberty, aa far as possible, to engage 
in that hind of production which suits best their tastes. X- t 
only is the labor eo<t of desiderata less when the laborer's t 
are consulted in assigning him Ins task, but he will turn out 
better products, and at a greater speed, for a man will gen- 
erally BUCCeed best in tin 1 kind of work he likes the best. Ifenee 
■ • liberty in choosing or changing their employment 
Bhould h led all laborers. To facilitate this a National 

I r Exchange should he organized. Each department of 
government should make periodic — say monthly — reports to 
of existing vacancies, if any, specifying 
iling hour- of labor, character of work, local 



PANTOCRACY 81 

etc. These reports, converted into properly classified lists, 
should be published monthly by the labor exchange and distrib- 
uted, so that every one in the country could have easy access 
to them without leaving his own town. Every post office, 
library, etc., should receive copies. Every person qualified, 
whether employed or not, should be entitled to apply for the 
positions thus vacant. Besides this there should be published 
and distributed less frequent reports setting forth all positions 
in all departments, whether vacant or not, so that persons could 
apply for positions not vacant with the object of anticipating 
future vacancies. Applications for any or all these positions 
should be made in writing to the labor exchange, and the same 
man should be permitted to apply for as many positions as he 
chose, so that he would have a wide latitude of choice and a 
better chance of changing his occupation if that in which he 
was engaged failed to suit him. All applications should be 
filed in one department, organized for the sole purpose of facili- 
tating the adaptation of producers to their work. In those 
industrial departments in which the supply of, exceeded the 
demand for, labor these applications would constitute a waiting 
list from which should be selected those to fill the vacancies 
caused by death, retirement, or exchange in, or expansion of, 
the operating force. It should be required of every candidate 
for a particular position that he show himself by examina- 
tion, previous training, or otherwise, well fitted to fill it. To 
each of his various applications for employment each candi- 
date should be required to affix one and only one number, (1), 
(2), (3), (4), etc., called a preference number, indicating 
whether the position was his first, second, third, fourth, etc., 
choice among those for which he applied, and he should be at 
liberty to amend these numbers at any time he pleased. Of 
course, no candidate could apply for a position which he did not 
prefer to the one held by him at the time of his application, 
or amendment thereof. Of several candidates shown to be 
fitted for any position that one should be selected whose prefer- 
ence number was the lowest. If several were equally low, the 
selection between them should be by lot, precedence of filing, 
or by some other method shown by experience to be better than 
these. In those industrial departments in which the demand 
for, exceeded the supply of, labor there would be no waiting 
list, or only for certain positions. The mode of filling these 
vacancies will be considered under section (5). 

Under competition there is no more provision for adjusting 
6 



82 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

the supply of, to the demand for, labor than in the case of 
commodities. Everything is left to chance. A man must do 

the best he can. If he loses his position ho must either obtain 
another one through the influence of friends — often some- 
thing he does not want — or go wandering about u looking for 
a j<>l>. ,, glad if he can get anything. He does not know what 
positions throughout the country are vacant, nor do those who 
desire particular services always know where they can obtain 
men to perform them. In an inadequate manner, advertising 
fulfils this function locally, but it is a poor substitute for a 
national labor exchange. With the organization of society into a 
mechanism for the production of happiness, and the establish- 
ment of a bureau for the purpose of deliberately adapting a man's 
occupation to his powers and preferences, far more real liberty 
would be gained by the average laborer — that is the people — 
than was gained by the abolition of slavery and serfdom and the 
establishment of so-called free labor. Eeal liberty was doubtless, 
in the end, increased by this step, and yet the curse of competi- 
tion immediately ensuing on the liberation of labor, set in opera- 
tion a compensating influence which largely neutralized the in- 
crease. We have only to read Marx's account of the "free" 
agricultural laborers of England just after the downfall of 
feudalism to become convinced that their real liberty was less 
than before they had been liberated from serfdom and divorced 
from the soil, although their legal liberty was certainly greater. 
The gain from exchanging slavery for free labor is frequently a 
gain of legal, more than of real, liberty. The establishment of 
the so-called " free laborer " is, however, merely a step in the 
evolution of society which will eventually produce laborers who 
arc really free, emancipated not only from the labor imposed 
by man, but from that imposed by nature. The real freedom 
o{' the laborer consists in freedom from labor — and common 
sense will eventually accomplish it. Some human labor will 
always be necessary, but it will involve little labor cost and its 
burden will be negligible. 

A policy very different from that which we have propounded 
in this section is often imputed to socialism. It has been 
seriously proposed by some persons who agree with the doc- 
trines of Marx that the assignment of men to their vocations 
shall be determined — not by their own preference — but by a 
governmental commission which shall pronounce upon their 
qualifications and assign each his place in the mechanism of 
social production, according to its notions of his fitness. This 



5 



PANTOCKACY 83 

policy has no relation to socialism and it is obviously utterly 
repugnant to utility. Some socialists may perhaps advocate 
it, but this does not make it socialism. It is interesting to 
observe that the dogmatic school takes violent exception to this 
doctrine and very justly points out that it would lead to a 
most uncomfortable condition of society. Blind beings — do 
they "not recognize their own offspring? Of course it would 
make life uncomfortable, but if wealth is the object of na- 
tional existence, why should we scruple about comfort? Do 
we not defile our cities with soot and vile effluvia, pollute our 
streams, disfigure and destroy the beauties of nature, dissipate 
her resources, waste the lives of men and women, and even of 
children, in the pursuit of wealth ? If it is worth while to sac- 
rifice so much to Mammon, why should we feel delicacy in 
sacrificing a little more? The motto of the commercial moral- 
ist of the day is " business before pleasure," and in this so- 
called socialistic policy such a motto is consistently applied. 
We sacrifice most things now to business, why not sacrifice 
men's inclination to a vocation as well? If it is sensible to 
sacrifice the end to the means once, then it is sensible to do 
so twice, thrice, or any number of times. The motto of the 
utilitarian is "pleasure before business," although not neces- 
sarily antecedent thereto. He therefore always considers the 
end before the means, and instead of sacrificing men's inclina- 
tions to business, sacrifices business to their inclinations. He 
lets men determine their own vocations instead of letting busi- 
ness determine them. The policy here criticised is not only 
not socialistic, but it is a typical product of the dogmatic 
school and in harmony with its theory and practice. 

Section (4) A third department of government should com- 
prise a Bureau of Inspection whose function should be to keep 
the quality of all products at a required standard. Its agents 
should be in every government plant and should be held jointly 
responsible with the directors of that plant for the quality of 
the product there turned out; so that if the consumer found 
it otherwise than as represented the responsibility would be 
at once fixed. Of course, with the abolition of capitalism most 
of the temptation to the production of inferior products would 
be done away with, and little more would be required than to 
guard against the effects of hasty work. For the purpose of 
improving the quality of products, premiums could be placed 
upon such improvements, corresponding to those which gov- 
ernments often place upon the speed of war-vessels. In this 



i HE POL] I I' UTILITY 

manner the quality of all commodities could be maintained 

and improved, and the purchaser could have confidence in what 
\ alteration would cease, sale-men could be be- 
asity tor each plant maintaining an insp 
bureau of its own, as at present required, would be disp 
with, ami the demoralization inseparable from systematic adul- 
teration, substitution, and misrepresentation, would be abol- 
ished. J _ _■ from the incomplete statistics of adulteration 
published, the saving to the nation from this Bource alone 
would be several hundred million dollar- a year, not to - 
of the savin-- in the health, physical and moral, of I 

ity. The bureau of inspection would thus control the 
quality of products, while the department of output regula- 
tion would control their quantity. Upon the conditions under 
capitalistic production it is unnecessary to dwell. We 
already briefly referred to them. Under capitalism cheating oc- 
cur- because there is profit to be made by cheating — there is 
a virtual premium upon it — with human nature as it is then 
can we expect anything different? Government inspection of 
the products of private monopoly would be an expensive and 
doubtful expedient, which would but tempt capitalists to cor- 
ruption in their effort to evade the objects of inspection. 

The departments of output regulation, of distribution, the 
labor exchange, and the inspection bureau, have been but 
briefly and broadly described, because their organization is 
quite normal and familiar. It would be a> ea8y to 
ganize these parts of the pantocratic mechanism as it would 
be to organize the War department or that of the Interior. 
Any skilled administrator could accomplish it. V\ 
tion (5) we shall describe a system which is not so familiar 
and possessing features requiring more specific exposition. It 
is the critical feature of the pantocratic mechanism, t : 
pulse of the machine," and it is important thai it- operating prin- 
ciple should be understood. 1 shall not discuss every detail, 
nor anticipate every objection, bul the exposition of the 
will, nevertheless, be more complete than any other. 

9 lion (5) Each commodity producing industry, or group 
of closely related industries, should constitute a separate depart- 

rernment. To illustrate the organization of I 
departments I shall describe one, which may be con-id 
typical of all. It may be discussed in two part-: (I) The 
tion of receipts and expenditures. (2) The disposition 
rsonneL In describing the system I shall employ a month 



PANTOCRACY 85 

as a unit of readjustment, but a unit consisting of a quarter, 
or some other period, might serve as well, or perhaps better. 

(1) Corresponding to each industrial department a sep- 
arate division of the Treasury department should be created, 
controlled by a separate governing body or hoard. The re- 
ceipts from the sale of all commodities should be transmitted 
to the Treasury, or one of the sub-treasuries, and duly credited 
to the proper industrial department. The gross monthly re- 
ceipts of each department should be divided into four funds. 

(a) The expense fund — the money properly creditable to the 
operating expenses of the month, exclusive of compensation to 
personnel, including expenditures for material, machinery, re- 
pairs, insurance, deterioration, etc. 

(b) The improvement fund — a sinking fund for improve- 
ments and enlargements of plant, the monthly amount of which 
should depend upon the fund already accumulated,, and deter- 
minable for each month by the local board of improvement. 
This fund itself should be divided into two. (1) A smaller 
part, consisting of a predetermined percentage of the whole, ex- 
pendable at the discretion of the chief directors, called the 
active fund; and (2) A larger part, expendable only at the dis- 
cretion of the board of improvement, and called the reserve 
fund. 

(c) The tax fund — a tax levied on each revenue-produc- 
ing department by the government, for the support of those de- 
partments which have no independent means of support, such 
as the Army and Navy, the Pension Office, etc. It should be 
proportional to the number of the personnel, and to the average 
compensation per capita, in each department. In an advanced 
stage of public monopoly such a method of taxation would be 
a substitute for the present tariff and internal revenue, and 
would be much more equable. The disposition of the fund 
collected from taxes should of course be, as at present, deter- 
mined by the legislature. 

(d) The wages fund — consisting of the gross receipts, less 
funds (a), (b), and (c), to be distributed as compensation to 
the personnel in the manner to be hereafter specified. 

(2) The personnel should be divided into two corps: (A) 
Wage earners. (B) Directors. 

(A) The function of the wage earners should be to carry 
out the orders of the directors. They constitute the bulk of 
the personnel and should be divided into many classes. For 
example, in such an industry as that of steel making, they 



86 THE P0LI1 K > OF I fTIIJ J J 

would consist of ordinary laborers, foundrymen, machinists, 
engineers, carpenters, draughtsmen, clerks, etc. A regular 
scale of corresponding to thai established in such a de- 

partment as the Pos1 Office, Bhould be prepared, the wag 
each wage earner being proportioned to the .-kill and experi- 
ence required of him — with this exception, that Length of 
should be deemed a factor and an advance mad*' for 
each year thai the wage earner served the state. Should wages 
fall, for hereafter t<> be specified, they would, of course, 

fall by the Bame percentage for all wages. No wage earner 
Bhould be dischargeable except upon written charges, as at pres- 
ent under the civil service. Proved wilful inefficiency should 
be a ground for discharge. Proved involuntary inefficiency 
a ground for decrease of wages. 

(B) The directors Bhould he divided into one or more chief 
directors, corresponding to the president or general manager of 
a great corporation, and various subordinate directors in charge 
of important divisions of the industry. The function of the 
directors should be to manage the work of production and 
direct the wage earners. They Bhould be required to attain 
two objects: (1) To deliver to the department of distribu- 
tion the quantity of product called for by the regulator of 
output. (2) To improve the efficiency of production by the in- 
iction of labor-saving machinery, and economies in divi- 
sion of labor, manipulation, or other details of management. 
Corresponding to these two objects their compensation should 
be of two kinds. 

(1) A wage, as in the case of a wage-earner, proportioned 
to til- 1 skill and experience required. This would be as con- 
stant as any other wage. (2) Conditional compensation de- 
termined as follow- : 

vx industry produces one or more products. The a 
time expended in producing each product is determinable. 
Call this the producing time. It should be reported to the 
erning board of the department, monthly. If the producing 
times of the several products contained in the output be added 
ther, and the same divided by the number of products, the 
quotient will be the average producing time for the output of 
the industry. This will be a Function of the average productive 

Capacity. On the date upon which any director assumes ollice 

average producing time Bhould bo considered that recorded 

e last monthly report. \'<.w in addition io his wage, each 

director should receive compensation whose amount is condi- 



PANTOCRACY 87 

tioned upon the decrease in the average producing time since 
he entered office. If this time increases, of course, he receives 
only his wage; if the arts and economies of production con- 
tinually improve — as they should do — the producing time 
will decrease, and his conditional compensation will be greater 
the longer he holds office, and the more successful he is in pro- 
moting improvement in the arts and in industrial organization. 
The conditional compensation of the chief directors should be 
greater than for their subordinates, and should, in fact, be 
graded according to the importance of each man as a factor in 
production. It should be great enough in every case to afford 
a keen incentive to every director to expend his zeal and in- 
genuity in diminishing the average producing time — in increas- 
ing the efficiency of production. The precise manner in which 
the shortening of the producing time is made to accrue to the 
benefit of the producer will be explained presently. Each direc- 
tor on first assuming office should receive only his wage, because 
conditional compensation should be a recompense for service 
in increasing the efficiency of production, and no man who had 
not rendered such service would be entitled to it. The award 
of conditional compensation in the manner specified is no more 
than an extension of the ordinary principle of awarding com- 
pensation for services rendered. Improvement in the arts is 
something useful to society, just as bricks, or bolts, or horse- 
shoes are useful to society ; and just as those who produce bricks, 
or bolts, or horseshoes for society are compensated in proportion 
to the amount of those commodities which they respectively pro- 
duce, so those who produce improvements in the arts for society 
should be compensated in proportion to the amount of improve- 
ment they produce. 

In the fulfilment of their functions the directors have power 
to direct the labors of all wage earners during working hours, 
to readjust the character of their employment as much as 
they deem necessary within the industry, and they have com- 
plete control over the active portion of the improvement fund. 
They have no power of discharge, or alteration of wage except 
upon written charges to a civil service board; they must keep 
the hours of labor of all wage earners equal, or introduce in- 
equality only with the consent of the parties concerned, and 
they have only an advisory power in determining how the 
hours of labor of the operating force, as a whole, shall be dis- 
tributed through the month. 

It is clear that by this expedient we have accomplished two 



88 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

objects: (1) Wo have supplied the directors of industry with 
an incentive to improve the arts — the same incentive fur- 
Dished by profit, viz., increased compensation conditioned upon 
:i improving Baid arts, and (2) We have altered their 
incentive to increase the hours of labor of wage earners into 
one to diminish them — thus making the interest of directors 
and wage earners identical instead of antagonistic; and with 
s, oeither director nor wage earner should have anything 
s being fixed by law. Having thus made the im 
of laborer and director of Labor identical, is it possible to make 
thai of both identical with the interest of the consumer, thus 
abolishing the one remaining industrial antagonism — that be- 
tween buyer and seller? There is hut one method of accom- 
plishing this — that of diminishing the price of commodities 
as their producing time diminishes. This, of course, would 
benefit consumers, hut would it not he a harm to producers by 
diminishing the wage fund? We propose to show that under 
any hut abnormal conditions it would not: and under condi- 
tions where it would, only temporary inconvenience would 
result. 

On first assuming the management of any industry, the gov- 
erning hoard, alter an analysis of production, should determine 
tin 1 producing time of all products, ('all the time so deter- 
mined the initial prodtucmg time The initial prices should 
he fixed in conformity therewith. To make plain the subse- 
quent mode of operation in a commodity producing industry, 
I shall describe the precise procedure lor a sample industry, 
hut to simplify the explanation shall assume that its output 
consists of hut one commodity, and that only two clas-> 
wa-e earners are engaged in its production. 

Assume that the directors of all industries receive from the 
regulator of output on the first of each month a requisition 
which shall specify what commodities, and what quantity there- 
of, -hall he produced and delivered to the distributor for the 
mouth next hut one following. Thus on the 1m of May the 
requisition which shall determine the output for June would 
be received. Suppose the directors of the sample industry to 
receive such a report on May 1st, 19 — , requiring that they 
deliv.-r to the distributors by July 1st, 1,020,000 of the com- 
modity which they produce. 

Under these conditions are six different possibilities all 

of which should be considered. (a) Any desired increase in 
the personnel can he secured through the Labor exchange, (b) 



PANTOCEACY 89 

It cannot. An industry in condition (a) may be called in a 
supplied condition; one in condition (b) in an unsupplied 
condition. Under each of these conditions three cases should 
be discussed. The output required for the month of June 
will be either (1) Greater than the amount which can be de- 
livered by the operating force without increase in the hours 
of labor beyond the standard time (See p. 91) for June, (2) 
Equal to the amount, or (3) Less than the amount. ^ Let us 
call an industry subject to the first condition over stimulated, 
that subject to the second unstimulated, and that subject to 
the third understimidated. This exhausts all possibilities, and 
if the industrial mechanism we propose is so constructed as to 
automatically adjust itself to each and all of these conditions, 
then it cannot be thrown out of gear, except by a social convul- 
sion such as would wreck any system proposable. As the ad- 
vance in the arts will diminish the price of commodities with- 
out diminishing nominal wages, consumption, and therefore 
demand, will be stimulated more and more, and the normal 
condition of an industry will be one of overstimulation. That 
is, on the introduction of the pantocratic system into any com- 
munity (a)l would be the normal condition of industry, and 
in the later stages (b)l. Under any conditions, unstimulated 
and understimulated industries would be exceptional. 

Let us consider each case in order, and first let us first assume 
the sample industry to be in the condition represented by 
(a) 1. 

(a)l. The problems which the directors have to solve are 
(1) How to fill the requisition, i. e. how to supply the demand, 
with the least labor cost, and (2) How to adjust the price to 
the hours of labor and the number of workmen, so that price 
and hours of labor shall both diminish. Under the conditions 
represented by (a)l both of these ends many be attained by 
a mode of procedure adaptable to all commodity producing in- 
dustries, and with slight alterations to all industries. This mode 
of procedure is as follows : 

The information needed by the directors and the governing 
board in guiding their policy is provided by the monthly re- 
port required of every industry. The report of the sample in- 
dustry for the month of April, issued May 1st, would, among 
other information, include the following: (Specific data are 
furnished in order to make the explanation clear.) 



90 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

No. of Wage-earners Of Clasfl 1 receiving B nominal wage Of $1)4.04 per 

month 1,000 

So. lere of ( Lass -2 receiving a nominal wa 8,78 per 

month 

Total commodities produced in April 1,000,000 

Average duration of a day's Labor (j hour-. 4 minutes 

Total time spent in producing 1,000,000 commodities, 47,320,000 minutes 
Producing time for April 47..*^ minutes 

The report for March 1st would contain the following: 
Producing time for February 47.872 minutes 

From this in formation can be calculated, in the first place, 
the decrease in producing time for two month-: 47.872- 
47.32 = .552 minutes. One assumption, and a sufficiently safe 
one, is imw necessary to adjust the industry to the task re- 
quired in dune, and we shall see later that if the assumption 
proves erroneous, the system is not disturbed (p. 101). It 
is assumed that the average decrease in the producing time 
tween May 1st and July 1st will be equal to that betw< 
March 1st and May 1st. That is, it is assumed that the pro- 
ducing time will diminish as much in one month as in another 
closely contiguous thereto. If this assumption be sound, the 
5,000 wage earners who produced 1,000, 000 commodities in 
April in 47,320,000 minutes, will in June, if they work the 
same length of time, produce 1,011,800 commodities. Now, if 
they should work the same length of time in June as in 
April, the whole gain resulting from the decreased producing 
time would go to the consumer. If, on the other hand, they 
worked only just long enough to produce the 1,000,000 com- 
modities which they produced in April, the whole gain would 

to the producer. How then shall we divide the advant, 
derived from improvement in the arts between producer and 
consumer? This is accomplished by a device which I shall 
call the industrial coefficient. Normally it would be fractional. 
The besl value for the industrial coefficient cannot be pre- 
dicted apriori. Experience alone can determine it, and it prob- 
ably should be changed from time to time. Let us assume that 
in May, 19 — , it is j. [f new we multiply the assumed gain 
in producing time by this fraction we shall obtain the product 
.138 and this number, instead of .552, will be used to determine 
the number of commodities to be produced by the 5,000 work- 
men in June. Thai is, they will be required to labor such 
time as will suffice to produce 1,002,920 commodities. Call 
this the standard number of commodities for June. It is ob- 



PANTOCEACY 91 

tained by multiplying the assumed gain in producing time by 
the industrial coefficient, subtracting the product so obtained 
from the producing time for April, and dividing the remainder 
into the time required to produce the April output. 

Thus in June the number of minutes labor required of each 
wage earner will be about 9,381, which is equivalent to six 
hours, one minute per day, a decrease since April of three 
minutes per day in hours of labor. This is called the standard 
time for June in the sample industry; that is, the standard 
time is the number of minutes per day or per month required 
to produce the standard number of commodities. But 1,020,- 
000 commodities were called for, and this only accounts for 
1,002,920. Hence, 17,080 commodities must be produced by 
other laborers. The number of laborers required for this pur- 
pose, assuming for simplicity that none were added May 1st, 
can be discovered by the proportion : 

1,002,920 : 5,000 : : 17,080 : X 
X in this case is 85. The kind of workmen to be secured must 
be determined in each case by the directors, since they know 
what kind are required, but they will probably be of the same 
kind and in the same relative proportion as those already em- 
ployed, viz., one of class (1) to every four of class (2). That 
is, of the 85 new men, 17 will be of class (1) and 68 of class 
(2). One month will then be available to obtain the new men 
through the labor exchange. It may happen that some of the 
wage earners in the sample industry will, in the meantime, 
withdraw to other industries, but by having a month's leeway 
all these inter-industrial adjustments should take place with 
the minimum disturbance of industry, all men reporting for 
work at their new places on the first of the month, and not 
leaving their old until the last of the month, unless they re- 
quire time to traverse the distance from their old to their new 
place of employment. Of course, inter-industrial exchanges of 
wage earners could take place at other times, but industry 
would suffer least disturbance by having the principal change 
come at definite periods. Thus a means is provided for ab- 
sorbing new wage earners into an industry who will enter it 
under the same favorable conditions of wages and hours as 
those already there ; at the same time insuring that the demand 
shall be supplied. 

The mode of making the producer gain by a decrease in the 
producing time is now obvious. Next let us see how the con- 



ftd THE POLITICS OF rriLiTV 

sur/irr is to gain by it. Bow shall the price be adjusted to 
give li i in his share in the industrial advanc \ 

It Bhould be the function of the governing board to fix 
prices. These, of course, will depend upon the total expense, 
and this will be the Bum of the expenses attributable to the 

ir funds (a), (b), (c), (d) ; that attributable to funds I 
and (c) evidently being very Blight compared to that tor funds 
(a) and (d). The price for dun.' need not be fixed until 
July 1st, by which time the following information will be 
available : 

Expense per commodity for June attributable to fund (a) .. 19.Tr> cents 
Expense per commodity for June attributable to fund (b) .. 00.70 cents 

Expense per commodity for June attributable to fund (c) .. 00. Mo cents 

Sum 20.75 cents 

To this must 1)0 added the main expense — that attributable 
to the wages fund : 

No. of wage-earners of Class (1) — 1,017 at a wage of 

64 per month $ 96,248.88 

No, of wage-earners of Class (2) — 4,068 at a wage of 

$78.78 per month 320,477.04 

Compensation of Directors (assumed 4 per cent of compen- 

Bat ion of wage-earners) 16,660.04 

Sum $433,394.96 

Dividing this total wage? fund by 1,020,000, the number of 
commodities produced in Juno, the quotient is 42.50 cents per 
commodity. The total expense is then 42.50 20.75 63.25 
cents. This is the price at which the whole 1,020,000 com- 
modities are delivered to the distributor at the works. 'The 
price to the consumer is tins sum, plus the cost of distribution 
calculated in the same manner. 

The expense in April would appeal in the report of May 1st. 
The expense per commodity attributable to fund (a) would 
normally be greater than for dune, because this fund goes for 
services and supplies, and these are constantly cheapening 
through the same process as thai by which the commodity of 
the sample industry cheapens. Thus, the Tall in the price of 
commodities produced by any industry will be a function, not 
alone of the decrease in the producing time in thai industry, 
but in all industries from which it draw- its supplies of raw 
material, machinery, etc., or whose services it requires in any 



PANTOCBACY 93 

capacity. The expense per commodity attributable to funds 
(b) and (c) would normally also be slightly larger for April 
than for June, but for simplicity we shall assume that they are 
the same. The April expense per commodity then would be 
something like this: 

Expense per commodity attributable to fund (a) 20.00 cents 

Expense per commodity attributable to fund (b) 00.70 cents 

Expense per commodity attributable to fund (c) 00.30 cents 

Sum 21.00 cents 

To this the wages fund should be added. 

1,000 wage-earners at $94.64 per month $ 94,640.00 

4,000 wage-earners at $78.78 per month 315,120.00 

Compensation of Directors (4 per cent of compensation of 

wage-earners) 16,390.40 

Sum $426,150.40 

Dividing by 1,000,000, the number of commodities, we get 
42.615 cents as the expense per commodity attributable to fund 
(d). Adding this to the other expenses, we have 21 + 42.615 = 
63.615 cents as the price at which the commodity is delivered 
to the distributor in April. Comparing this with the price in 
June, we see that it has fallen 00.365 cents in two months, a 
gain to the consumer of about 00.6%. To make these same 
calculations for any industry is merely a matter of bookkeeping. 

All fiscal transactions between the various industrial depart- 
ments, whereby the accounts of each with the others are ad- 
justed, would be carried on between the respective governing 
boards. In other words, all such transactions would be con- 
fined to the Treasury department, and with them neither the 
directors nor the wage earners of any industry would be con- 
cerned. Their whole attention would be focussed on the prob- 
lems of production, the resulting fiscal transfers being removed 
from their consideration. 

Although normally the expense per commodity, as calcu- 
lated by the method explained above, will fall — in excep- 
tional cases it will rise. In any given industry, the rise may 
be due to: (1) Bad management in the industry itself, where- 
by the producing time increases instead of decreasing: (2) 
Bad management in industries from which supplies are drawn : 
or (3) The exhaustion of natural resources upon which the 
given industry depends for its raw materials : that is, the usual 



94 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

order of things may be reversed, and the law of diminishing re- 
turns of labor operate to increase the labor cost of commodi- 
ties more effectively than the law of increasing returns can 
operate to diminish it. Whenever, from any of these caue 
the labor cost of a commodity increases, the price, calculated 

• haw indicated, will rise instead of fall, and this [g just 
what it should do to maintain the industry in a position of 
sel ('-support. Besides fluctuations from the cause- mentioned, 
slight fluctuations would perhaps occur from another can 
The expense fund (fund a) will, if the system of bookkeeping 
is defective, fluctuate considerably, because repairs, additions, 
and other sources of expense, are not uniformly distributed 
throughout the year; and were this not allowed for, incon- 
venient fluctuations in prices would result. With a scientific 
iem of bookkeeping, however, such lack of uniformity can 
he equalized, and the share of the total expense properly at- 
tributable to each commodity for each month adjusted in such 
a manner as to avoid inconvenient fluctuations. The devices 
for accomplishing this are not suited to explanation here, but 
are sufficiently familiar to those who are concerned with the 
technicalities of bookkeeping. 

We thus see how, under the conditions postulated, the sam- 
ple industry would conduct itself on the receipt of the report 
of the regulator of output embodying the demand of the na- 
tion. If it continued in condition (a) 1, this same procedure 
would be repeated each month, the industry growing with the 
demand which it was called upon to supply. If it did not 
continue in condition (a)l, it would revert to one of the 
other conditions mentioned on page 89, which will be discussed 
in their order. 

The reason why any industry the demand for w r hose products 

sufficient, can continuously increase the benefit accruing both 

to consumer and producer is obvious. It is because the price 

can be lowered, thus benefiting the consumer, and at the same 

lime the number of commodities to be produced so increased 

as to keep wages as high as before, because, though the price 

per commodity is less, the number of commodities sold is more. 

v if the arts are advancing, every ovorstimulated industry 

while steadily lowering prices will, at the same time, shorten 

hours of labor and absorb the unemployed. This reacts 

on all industries; increasing the consumption per capita of 

those already employed, and at the same time converting non- 



PANTOCRACY 95 

producers into producers and thus increasing their consump- 
tion per capita. 

Perhaps the reader may consider that the fall in price and 
reduction of hours we have cited in our specific example is in- 
significant, but if he will make a slight calculation he can as- 
sure himself that the same rate of advance in all industries 
would in ten years (1) Absorb a greater army of unemployed 
than any nation ever had. (2) Increase the purchasing power 
of every dollar nearly thirty per cent. (3) Decrease the hours 
of labor about thirty per cent. Thus it would increase by 
nearly one-third the real wages of every wage earner, and if the 
hours of labor had originally been nine a day, they would, in 
the ten years, fall to about six and a quarter. ^ Moreover there 
would be no army of unwilling unemployed. ' Such a rate of 
improvement, if maintained for a single generation, would make 
every member of the community well-to-do, and reduce the work- 
ing day to about three hours. Of course, the example given is 
but an example, but it is doubtless an under rather than an over 
estimate of what the conversion of politics into a branch of 
technology would do for humanity. 

From the example given it will be clear why no provision is 
made for any general advance in wages in any industry. It 
would be useless, since a general rise in nominal wages would 
not in itself raise the real wages of any one. The system pro- 
posed, however, by constantly diminishing prices while holding 
nominal wages constant, increases the purchasing power of the 
dollar and thus continuously raises the real wages of every 
wage earner in the community, and this simultaneously with 
a decrease in his hours of labor. 

(a) 2. An industry is unstimulated if the demand for its 
products is just that which is required to occupy the personnel 
already employed by it for the standard time, i. e. for the num- 
ber of hours and no more w T hich they would have been called 
upon to work had the industry been overstimulated. Thus in 
the example cited, had the sample industry been called upon to 
supply 1,002,920 commodities in June instead of 1,020,000, it 
would have been unstimulated. In this case the price and the 
hours of labor will fall just as in (a)l but there will be no 
increase in the personnel. Otherwise all is as in (a)l. 

(a) 3. In overstimulated and unstimulated industries the 
normal fall in price of commodities is due to two main causes : 
(1) The decrease of expense per commodity due to fund (a) 
attributable to advance in related industries. (2) The de- 



9G THE POLITICS OF riTLITY 

3e per commodity due to fund (d) attributable to advance 
in the industry itself, both resulting from increase in the pro- 
ductive power per capita. In understimulated industries only 
- .; Lses of a diminished price is operative, be- 
tnand is insufficienl to cause each operative to in- 

-•• hi- production. Eence for onderstimulated industries 

price should be determined as in the case of overstimulated 
ami unstimulated one- so far as it is attributable to funds (a), 
(h), and (c) — l>ut thai part of the price per commodity at- 
tributable to fund (d) should remain stationary, that is. it should 
be precisely as in the month preceding. Thus in onderstimu- 
lated industries prices will not fall as rapidly as in oth 

A< the demand in such industries can he supplied by Less 
than the standard labor time, the hours of Labor of those en- 
gaged in the industry will diminish; their wage will also di- 
minish, because alter paying the expenses attributable to funds 
(a), (1)), and (c), there will not be enough to pay the nominal 
In this ease all wages are diminished pro rata. Other- 
wise all is as in (a)l. It may be deemed by some critic- a 
fault in the system that there is not some provision to prevent 

decline of wages in an understimulated industry, but any 
such provision would be a bad — not a good feature. An in- 
crease in the price might be such a provision or it might not, 
but in any case it would he an incorrect policy. The proper 

inse to make to understimulation is not increase in price, 
but < e in personnel, and this would take place automati- 

cally. For every understimulated industry there would, in any 
normal condition of socictv, be many that were overstimulated, 
and if wages continued to fall, wage earners would — without 
any break in production or intermediate period of unemploy- 

• — withdraw from understimulated industries to overstimu- 
i ■ 3. This would be accomplished without difficulty or 
hitch through the labor exchange. In other words, the laborers 
would discharge themselves, not into an unemployed condition, 
as in the competitive system, but directly into an overstimulated 
industry. In fact, under all conditions, labor will tend to flow 
from onderstimulated to overstimulated industries by a m 
failing law of human nature — that of self-interest. Thus any 
industry would adjust it-elf automatically to local understimu- 
lation, for the d( in personnel would leave the available 

- fund to be divided among fewer wage earners — the wages 

would return to their nominal value, the hours oi' labor to the 



PANTOCRACY 97 

standard, and the industry would pass into the unstimulated 
class. 

This is the point to discuss the question of fluctuating in- 
dustries, or those the demand for whose products varies with 
the time of the year. Under present conditions there are 
many such, and the periodic stimulation and slackness which 
results is a cause of much chaos in industry, and distress among 
wage earners. The system of pantocracy has peculiar advan- 
tages in dealing with industries of this class. Fluctuating in- 
dustries may be divided into two classes. (1) Those whose 
fluctuations are foreseeable. (2) Those whose fluctuations are 
not. The first include almost all fluctuating industries, and it 
is obvious that they can be converted into non-fluctuating indus- 
tries by means of the department of output regulation, which, 
anticipating the fluctuations, can provide against them, and 
requisition for every month approximately the same output as 
for every other in the year. This steadying is not possible for 
such industries as fluctuate irregularly and in a manner which 
cannot be anticipated, and such must adjust themselves by cor- 
responding irregular fluctuations in personnel. 

(b)l. When we turn our attention to the condition of indus- 
try represented by (b)l, an interesting situation is encoun- 
tered. In the first place, no such condition could exist while 
any but voluntary vagrants were unemployed. In other words, 
if we admit that an unsupplied industry can exist, we admit 
that poverty can be cured; for, with the equal distribution of 
wealth and the vast increase of leisure and productive power 
per capita under pantocracy, an employed person and a person 
emancipated from poverty, would be synonymous. To this it 
may be objected that there might be many persons unemployed 
so lacking in skill or experience as to be unadapted to the work 
required in such unsupplied industries as existed, and to this 
objection there are two replies. (1) Only to industries requir- 
ing skilled labor would the criticism apply in any case, and 
more and more as the arts advance skilled labor is dispensed 
with in production. Machinery makes it superfluous, as the 
skill required to run a machine can be acquired in a few days 
or weeks, or at most, months, by a totally inexperienced per- 
son. Thus any but an exceptional industry could absorb even 
the most inexperienced laborers, so long as they were able- 
bodied and possessed their faculties. The average producing 
time, of course, would not decrease so fast with green laborers, 
but this difficulty would be merely temporary. It would delay, 



OS THE POLITICS OF niUTY 

but not check, p t (2) T m of technical educa- 

tion m utocracy to be described under section (8) would 

insure thai all men would be skilled in one i producl 

arts — totally inexperienced and unskilled men would 

nol -iiiion. 

\ ow an unsupplied industry may either (1) Lose in num- 
ber of wage earners through more leaving than can be sup- 
plied, (2) Remain stationary in number of wage earners, as 
many being supplied as are lost, or (3) Gain in number of wi 
earners, bul gain less than the number called i'^v. In any c 
it simply means that the wage earners called for through 
labor exchange cannot be supplied, through lack of applications 
for the positions open. Failure to obtain the supply required, 
however, will nol threw the industrial mechanism out of g 
The price is calculated precisely as in the case of (a)l and I 
hours of Labor of the Bhort-handed operating force arc extended 
beyond the standard point sufficiently to supply the demand. 
The resull will be longer hours of labor, but the excess wag a 
fund will be divided equally among the wage earners. Thus, 
for example, suppose the sample industry discussed under (a)l 
was unable to gel Dew laborers, but able to hold all it had. 
The hours of Labor under the conditions named would tl 
have been extended from six hours and four minutes per day 
in April to six hours and seven minutes per day in June; I 
wages of class (1) advancing from $94.64 per month to $96.04 
per month, and of class (2) from $78.78 per month to $80.1'J per 
mouth. 

After absorption of the unemployed, the first industries to 

1 the lack of labor would be (1 ) Those the demand for w 1 
products was rapidly increasing, (2) Those in which the labor 
was unpleasant, it is possible that one or both of these class 
fit' industry would become so unsupplied that in spite of every 

trance in the arts which science could achieve, and h 
of the advance in wages incident thereto, the ! :' labor 

might so increase as to become excessive. It is perhaps hardly 
worth while to speculate as to the besl course to pursue in such 
;m emergency, since by the time it could arise, experience would 
have taughl men the besi means of meeting it; hut it would not 

difficuH to meet in any event. A Bel of rules adapted to 
each industry, specifying a pi in nominal 

as the hour- n\' labor increased, would doubtless suffice. This 

ild acl in t v. o ways : (1) B price it would 

check demand, and (2) By increasing the wages it would draw 



PANTOCRACY 99 

more wage earners from other industries. The unwillingness 
of men to work long hours at unpleasant occupations would 
produce such a condition of undersupply therein that partic- 
ular inducements would be required to tempt wage earners to 
enter them from pleasanter industries. A sufficiently high 
wage would, however, secure enough operatives to make possible 
abnormal subdivision of the tasks to be done. Thus in un- 
pleasant industries the hours of labor would tend to become 
unusually short and the wages unusually high. This would, 
of course, tend to increase the prices of the desiderata produced, 
but such a result would not be an evil, since by no other means 
can unpleasant occupations be brought into a condition of 
self-support. 

Of course, the arts will improve faster in some industries 
than in others. Backward industries, like unpleasant ones, in 
order to avoid a condition of undersupply, would be compelled 
to raise wages. By thus attracting a sufficient operating force 
they could, by dividing the tasks to be done among a greater 
number, maintain the working day as low as in progressive 
industries. Thus improvements in the arts in one industrial 
field would react upon all others, tending to free men from 
labor as well in unprogressive as in progressive industries. In 
this way all productive operations would automatically adjust 
themselves to a condition whose margin of self-support approxi- 
mated a maximum. 

(b)2. and (b)3. The industrial conditions represented by 
these two symbols will obviously be similar in every respect 
to those of (a) 2 and (a) 3, since as they do not need to absorb 
labor, difficulty in its absorption will not affect them. 

Thus we have considered all six of the cases specified on 
page 89, and it is plain that the system proposed will auto- 
matically adjust itself to any and all of them. It provides a 
complete means of adjusting the supply to the demand, both of 
commodities and of labor, coincident with a simultaneous in- 
crease in the efficiency of production and of consumption. In- 
cidentally, moreover, it opens the way to an important expan- 
sion in the liberty of the community — in real liberty — not in 
mere nominal liberty. This is rendered possible by the fact 
that as production is not carried on blindly — as each operat- 
ing force knows precisely what it must accomplish during each 
month — it can adapt its hours of labor to its tastes more eco- 
nomically than in the present treadmill mode of procedure. 
Thus at the first of each month, or a few days previous, the 



100 THE POLITICS OF 11 1L1 I V 

requisition from the regulator of output specifying exactly 
• commodities, and what quantity thereof, are to be produced 
by the industry in the month uexi ensuing, should be posted in 
every plant in said industry. With it should be conn 
a tabulation Bhowing the time which will be required, with the 
means at hand, to produce the output thus specified. Suppose* 
for example, it was estimated that the work could be accom- 
plished by the force available by working six hours a day for 
each working day in the month, that is Eot 26 days. Each man 
then knows exactly what the task required of his plant is — 
viz., to deliver to the distributors, commodities of the kind and 
quality specified in the requisition of the department of output 
regulation, of the quality required by the bureau of inspeel 
He knows also, very closely, the time which will he required 
to perform the task. It will require of each man 6x26 = 156 
hours of work during the month. Now it makes no difference 
to the consumer of commodities under what condition- they are 
produced, so Long as they are of the quality required, and this 
is insured by the bureau of inspection. Hence the ends of 
utility will best he subserved by permitting the producers, as 
a body, to (i\ for themselves, by a majority vote, the conditions 
which will best suit them, instead of having these conditions ir- 
ably fixed tor them, as at present. The 156 hours work 
per man required during the month can obviously he distrib- 
in a greal many ways. For example the required work 
can he accomplished : 

( 1 | By working (> hours per day for 26 days 

c!) u k * 6 " 30 minutes per day for 24 days 

(3) " " 7 « 5 " « " u 22 u 

(4) " " 7 " 48 " " " " 20 " 

(5) " " 8 " 40 « " " " 18 u 

(6) '" " 9 " 45 " " " " 16 " 

At the beginning of each month then the entire personnel 
could decide \)\ vote which of the various modes of distribu- 
of Labor was to be adopted for the month next ensuing, 
eiving the greatest number of votes being adopted. 
In this manner producers could determine to suit themselves 
way in which they would distribute their labor with the same 
\ — in fad with much greater liberty — than in the case 
all farmers, blacksmiths, or merchant.-, who are not em- 
ployees at all. They could, if they pleased, by working long 
hours each day, give themselves a vacation of a week, or i 



PAXTOCRACY 101 

two weeks, at the end of each month in which to employ them- 
is in adding to the output of the nation's happiness which, 
as it is the primary purpose of a nation, is their first duty to 
society. On the other hand, they might prefer shorter hours 
each day and no vacation, or they might prefer some intermediate 
mode of distributing their time and labor. Whatever the ma- 
jority preferred they could determine to suit themselves without 
prejudice to the consumer. It might even be so arranged that 
they could, if they pleased to so predetermine, work overtime 
during some months, anticipating the requisition of the months 
ensuing, so as to have a long vacation at times of the year 
in which they could most enjoy themselves, but in what degree 
such anticipation would be allowable experience alone could 
determine. Some limits would certainly have to be placed 
upon it, since otherwise difficulties might be met in adjusting 
production to consumption — a vital object of the pantocratic 
system. 

Of course it would not be possible for each man to choose 
for himself the time in which he would perform his labor, since 
the successful operation of a great plant requires a systematic 
and simultaneous co-operation between laborers, which could not 
be achieved if each man selected his own time for working ; but 
a definite plan of work, predetermined by a majority vote, would 
involve no such difficulty as this. 

Before going further two objections should be discussed, since 
they may enter the reader's mind and cause unnecessary mis- 
givings. These are : 

(1) The time assumed as that required to produce the 
monthly output called for by the regulator of output may be 
a miscalculation, resulting in inadjustment of supply to de- 
mand. 

(2) Leaving the control of their hours of labor so lar. 

in the hands of the wage earners might result in considerable 
periods in which the machinery of production was idle, which 
is undesirable. 

The first objection is easily answered. Every industry should 
keep in stock a surplus of every commodity they produce, suffi- 
ciently large to eliminate the clanger of a short supply. Xow 
if the time calculated as that required to produce the output is 
incorrect, it will be either too long or too short. If it is too 
long, then the residuum is simply added to the hours of leisure 
of the wage earners — the producer gains and the consumer 
does not lose. If it is too short the supply is made up from 



109 I HE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

surplus, and the following month extra work will have to 

one to bring the surplus hack to it- normal level; the labor 

required for this, of course, not being considered in fixing the 

ommodity. 

In ml objection, answer will incidentally 

be made to one which perhaps occurred to the reader on page 

'.•I. viz., bow can an industry expand in men without Bimul- 

ously expanding in the machinery which they require in pro- 
duction. This is simple. Every industry should keep its plant 

iderably Larger than is required for immediate needs, 
at the risk of some idle machinery. In do other way is it pos- 
sible to progressively absorb the Burplus labor of a Btate whoso 
population is increasing, dot to provide against rapid e 
sion in demand. The equipment of modern industry is com- 

. and each addition to a plant requires time to construct. 

proper time for these enlargements should be decided upon 
by the hoard of improvement, as will appear later. Economy 
in the employment of machinery normally requires that it be 
operated night and day, for by this policy less machinery is re- 
quired for a given rale of output than if it is allowed to remain 
idle all night. To work a plant night and day requires a suc- 
cession of shifts, and without making elaborate explanation-, 
it is obvious that Bimply by varying the length of the shifts 
according to the will of the majority the distribution of time 
spent in labor could be adapted to the taste of the majority with- 
out involving that idleness of machinery which would require an 
unnecessarily large plant. If. for example, the operating force 
should vote to so lengthen the hours of labor per day in a given 
month as to leave two weeks of complete freedom to each oper- 
ative, this would not mean that the plant would operate for 
two weeks and then >hut down tor two weeks. It would mean 
that half the operating force worked the first two weeks and 

other half the last two, the shift of each man being twice 
as long as if he worked every working day in the month. The 
details of assignment of duty, etc., would, o^ course, be left to 
the dii 

The rounder- of the American Republic in order to "estab- 
lish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the com- 
mon defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the bless- 

of liberty" to themselves and their posterity^ invented and 

put in operation a social mechanism which, since 1789, has 

1 to guide the nation in its attempt to achieve the ends 

led. This mechanism is called the Constitution, it is 






PANTOCRACY 103 

a purely artificial device, providing, or seeking to provide, a 
means whereby the people in their collective capacity may 
adopt such policies as appear to them most desirable. To 
this end it provides for a system of officials, legislative, ex- 
ecutive, and judicial, designed to carry into effect the will of 
the people, and directly or indirectly selected by the people. 
This is the principle which sanctions all representative gov- 
ernment and it is a sound one. It is no part of my purpose 
at this point to show the manner in which this purpose of 
the Constitution has been defeated, nor to trace in detail how 
by control of the machinery through which the people must 
express their choice of officials a small minority now determines 
for its own purposes the conduct and destiny of the nation. 
It is sufficient to remark that in accomplishing this end the 
dominant class of the community have simply availed them- 
selves of that universal quality of human nature which or- 
dains that men shall think in symbols, shall be guided by 
names, instead of by that for which the names are symbols. 
Having obtained control of the party names, the capitalistic 
class thereby control the party policy which, without any 
change of name, may be anything they choose to make it. 
Secure in this possession, they have at their leisure deter- 
mined the policy of the nation with a view to promoting their 
own welfare, and having capitalized all the material sources 
of profit available, have proceeded to capitalize the habits of a 
people who, unwitting if unwilling servants of the merest 
symbols, are held in bondage by those shrewd enough to profit 
by their infirmity. However successfully this particular in- 
tent of the Constitution builders has, through defective con- 
struction, been thwarted, the fact remains that the principle 
they had in mind was thoroughly sound in general. No better 
way of selecting those who are to fulfil a particular function 
has been discovered than by leaving their selection to those 
who are interested in having that function efficiently ful- 
filled. 

Now pantocracy provides for a class of officials (the direct- 
ing class) who may be considered homologous with capitalists 
under the present system. We know how capitalists are 
selected — through inheritance — through accident — through 
unusual intelligence, unusual unscrupulousness, or both. Were 
the capitalistic system so constituted that those whose will and 
ability to increase the efficiency of production and consump- 
tion was the greatest tended to come into control of industry, 



104 THE POLITICS OF rTILITY 

much might be Baid in it- favor; but this is obviously not the 

The system of conditional compensation insures that 

the directing class under pantocracy shall have the will to serve 

the community. How shall we insure that they shall have the 
ability? This may best be dene by providing that they be 
selected by those whose interesl it is that they have it. But it 
is to the interesl of all classes of the community that they have 

•uv under pantocracy the interest of all classes is identical. 
Hence perhaps as convenient a manner as any of Belecting the 
chief directors of industry would he to have them appointed 
by the President, as a representative of the consuming cla« 
general, the appointment to he confirmed by a vote of the per- 
sonnel of the industry io which they are to he assigned. The 
subordinate directors should, in general, he selected by the 
chief directors. The directors of any industry would prob- 
ably l>e selected from those who had worked their way up in 
that industry, since they would be most likely to have 
experience required to make them efficient, and the immediate 
self-interesl of all concerned in their choice would be op; 
to the -election of any but those who were efficient. 

One other feature of the pantocratic Bystem should be left 
to the will of the people as a whole. This is the industrial 
coefficient. A low value of the industrial coefficient would 
represenl a rapid decrease in hours of Labor, a slow ri- 

s, and relatively great inier-industrial adjustment. A high 
value of the coefficient would represent a slower decrease of hours 
of Labor, a rapid rise of wages, and Less inter-industrial adjust- 
ment. Experience alone could determine what value of tl i 
efficienl besl suited the tastes of the people. Heine they should 
determine it for themselves by the ballot. This, of course, is an 
• ■lenient of greal flexibility in the pantocratic system, and could 
be fixed, once a year, once every two years, or at any interval 
found to he desirable. In this way the advantage of improve- 
ment in the art- could be divided between producer and con- 
sumer in any ratio which the desires of the people might SUg- 

The principles explained in this section are applicable io other 

than commodity producing industries. Indeed they may be 
applied to all industries. Suppose, lor example, the government 
should take over the fire insurance business of the country, 
abolish profit and put in its place a system o\' conditional com- 
pensation, whose amount should depend upon the simultan 
shortening of hours of Labor of employees and fall in premiums. 



PANTOCRACY 105 

Improvements in fire prevention, economies in business methods 
and organization, and expansion of business would in a few 
years practically emancipate the employees from labor and reduce 
the premiums of all policy holders to a small fraction of what 
they are at present called upon to pay, and the same policy in 
life insurance would, in a less degree, benefit that branch of in- 
surance. Similarly the system could be adapted to transporta- 
tion and to agriculture, though the precise mode of application 
would have to be patiently worked out experimentally in each 
industry. 

Section (6) It should never be for a moment forgotten that 
the deliberate object of the mechanism we are engaged in de- 
scribing is the emancipation of mankind from misery by the 
application of science — the substitution for the present pain 
producing system of a pleasure producing system. One of the 
conditions essential to the fulfilment of this object is the devel- 
opment of a high efficiency of production, and upon the efforts 
to attain one all the forces of science should be focussed. So 
far the principal means we have proposed to secure that end 
consists in the diversion of the power of self-interest from a 
destructive into a constructive channel. By making the self- 
interest of director and wage earner identical with one another 
and with that of the consumer, the first step has been taken, 
for this means that the interest of each member of the com- 
munity is identical with that of the whole community, and it 
is to the interest of the community that the efficiency of pro- 
duction be increased to the utmost. But this is only a first step. 
Having so ordered the system that every individual has the 
desire to increase the efficiency of production, we should next 
supply him with the means of gratifying that desire. He has 
the will — all that is now required is the knowledge. 

Now upon what kind of knowledge is applied science founded ? 
It is founded upon a knowledge of pure or unapplied science. 
And what provision does capitalism make for this foundation 
of all improvement in the arts? None. As usual, it leaves it 
to chance. It is left to such isolated, disinterested students as 
may, by occupying in research the scant leisure left them by the 
struggle for existence, formulate the uniformities of nature 
upon which, are founded the vast network of inventions which 
make modern industry possible. Practically the whole of mod- 
ern science, and hence of modern civilization, has been developed 
by a few men who had only the love of truth as an incentive. 
Almost always poorly equipped, and having to waste the bulk 



toe THE POLITICS OF ITIUTY 

of their immeasurably valuable lives in getting a living, un- 
aided and unr< I by the powerful of their time, they 
pursued the thankless task of raising mankind from savagery, 
some stupid dog, lacerating the band which 

d bind it- woud . d sought to oppress and dis- 

courage ii- greatesl benefactors. Galileo persecuted, Columbus 
and imprisoned, Copernicus ridiculed, Bentham 
ignored, Paine hounded and impoverished, Marx exiled, and 
Darwin denounced, are typical illustrations of the treatment 
received by those who have sought to deliver men from the bond- 

of their ignorance. And more illustrious cases may be cited. 
Socrates and Christ sought to deviate mankind into common 
sense bo abruptly that the dogmatists of their time rewarded 
them with death. The conservatives of every age have been the 
bitterest foes of progress, and wherever dogma dominate- it must 
always be so. The real builders of civilization — those whose 
pursuit is truth — cannot hope for recognition from their own 
generation, and must work with what chance tools opportunity 
may grant them. Those to whom society awards her gr< 
prizes are those who most injure and exploit her. To the mo- 
nopolist she assigns wealth and power — to the material or 
moral pioneer, poverty and ridicule. 

A people aware of their own interests would never tolerate 
such a condition as this. The knowledge upon which tin 1 
emancipation of mankind depends should not he left to chance 
development. To promote Buch knowledge a Department of 

iai Improvement Bhould he organized. Under it 
of extensive national research laboratories should he established in 
every department of science, physical, chemical and biological. 
They should he equipped with every appliance required for re- 
search, including skilled workers in glass, wood, metal, etc., 

[es instrument makers, and men skilled in every variety of 
laboratory manipulation. The institutions thus equipped Bhould 
he put at the service of the ablest investigators in the country, 
drawn from the universities, technical Bchools, and institutions 
of learning. Systematic campaigns of research should he 
planned and carried out by an army of investigators working in 

■ rt. They should he offered such inducements that the 
vocation of investigator would he the most Bought ^\' any in the 

Country, and the best mind- drawn to the service. Their whole 

tion, undisturbed by the Decessity of making a livin 
I -aid be centered upon research. Each year a cer- 

tain Dumber -houhl he taken from those nominated by the uni- 



PANTOCKACY 107 

versities and technical schools — private and public — and the 
system should expand as the country increased in population. 
Division of labor should be introduced — not alone a separation 
of investigators into specialists, but a separation of investigators 
and manipulators; and the latter should outnumber the former 
at least four or five to one. As it is at present, the most gifted 
investigators are required to spend most of the little time they 
have in assembling and setting up apparatus. This is as waste- 
ful in research as it would be in business if the managers of 
great enterprises were compelled to write their own letters, file 
their own papers, clean their own inkstands, and attend to the 
thousand details which should be attended to by those whose 
time is less valuable. In practically all experimentation, pre- 
paration for experiment consumes 90 per cent, of the time. 
By introducing the principle of the division of labor, which has 
done so much for the mechanical arts, the art of investigation 
could be proportionally improved. The time of the best in- 
vestigators could be confined to thought and study, as it should 
be ; most of the actual manipulation could be left to men of the 
artisan class, trained to that art, and the great institutions of 
research could be run night and day like factories. By this 
policy results could be accomplished in a fraction of the time 
now required, and the few men out of each generation whom 
nature endows with great talents could make the most of their 
rare ability to serve the human race. In this way results, which 
would take a thousand years to accomplish under the present 
system, could be accomplished in fifty. The substitution of 
socialized for individualized research would increase the per 
capita output of discoveries in the same degree as the substitu- 
tion of socialized for individualized industry has increased the 
per capita output of commodities. 

Not the least important among these institutions of research 
should be those devoted to the study of medicine. Disease is 
the most appalling enemy of organic beings. Could it be con- 
quered the greatest single step toward solving the awful problem 
of pain would have been taken. No effort should be spared in 
this difficult field of investigation. It should not be left to 
such chance efforts as may be made by specialists in the inter- 
vals of practice or teaching; but disease should be made the 
object of organized attack. Every important variety of it 
should be studied by a body of specialists, equipped with the best 
apparatus available, and with every facility which ingenuity can 
devise. Those who carried on these investigations should have 



Kis THE POLITICS OF ITILITV 

not a part, but the whole, of their time to devote to the Bub* 
ject, and .-ill portions of the work not requiring highly trained 
men should be performed by assistants. These investigations 
should be carried on nighl and day. until disease, mental, moral, 
and physical is abolished <>r reduced to a minimum. Compared 
with a work like this, the building of railroads, the develop- 

■ of water-powers, and the dredging of canal-, is of such 
slight consequence a- to be negligible. He who can think other- 
wise has had his Bense of proportion hopelessly distorted by the 
Btrange commercial ideals of the time, ideals BO devoid of com- 
mon sense as to constitute a distinct variety of mania. 

Nor should scientific investigation he confined to those realms 
in which it is now customary to regard it as Legitimate. It 
should enter the psychical and moral fields now occupied by 
visionaries, cranks, and madmen; fields which develop the in- 
tellectual fungi of occultism, with its spooks, its oriental orgies, 
its lurid mysticism, its improvised religions, and all the other 
paraphernalia of pseudo-science or imaginative philosophy. 
There is much to Learn concerning these little investigated 
phenomena of mind, hut the way to learn it is to apply the 
method of common sense, the method by which we have learned 
all we know, and in the absence of which the word knowledge 
is meaningless, [gnorance has always regarded the unfamiliar 
as the supernatural, hut whatever basis in reality the delvers 
in psychical research may have for their observations, they will 
he besl revealed by open-in inded and systematic investigation. 
Much that is of vital interest to the happiness of mankind might 
he revealed hy such an investigation, and should preliminary 
amination justify it, this would he as reasonable a held of re- 
sear* h as any other. 

Associated with the institutions of pure research should be a 
system of Laboratories devoted to applied science. Each great 
industry, or division of industry, should have if- own Labora- 
tories whose Bole business it would he to devise and bring to per- 
fection improvements in the arts. To these Laboratories the 
besl inventors should he given every encouragement to < 
By the same system of divison of Labor as that suggested for the 

irch Laboratories they should he relieved of every task which 
would divert them from the immediate end Bought. The most 
successful Laboratories now pursue this policy, and with the 
ization and equipment which the government could afford 
to in-tall, the efficiency of co-operative invention could he vastly 
improved. 



PANTOCRACY 109 

The force employed in these technical laboratories would be 
in communication with the masters of science in the research 
laboratories, on the one hand, and with the workmen and fore- 
men engaged in the actual operation of the processes of pro- 
duction, on the other. Thus the pure theorist, the trained en- 
gineer, and the practical mechanic, would co-operate in every 
industry to develop those improvements in the arts upon which 
the emancipation of mankind depends; and every facility for, 
and incentive to, improvement should be afforded them. There 
would be no trade secrets, no concealed methods, because com- 
petition would be abolished and every one's interest would be 
the same. The operation of every great industry would be open 
to the inspection of all who could suggest modes of improve- 
ment therein. Specific rewards should be offered by the gov- 
ernment for specific improvements in methods, and those arts 
which were backward should be thus stimulated in the highest 
degree. Every inventor should be given incentives of this kind. 
As in the case of the director class of laborers, his reward should 
be made proportional to his success in achieving his ends. Sim- 
ilarly no limits should be placed upon the time that he should 
devote to invention and experiment, for it is to the interest of 
all concerned that those men upon whom the advance of human 
society depends should put as much of their time as possible into 
efforts to that end. Their capacity for benefiting society is 
greater than that of other men, and that capacity should not, 
by society, be permitted to go to waste. Moreover no work is 
pleasanter and more inspiring than theirs, particularly when 
relieved of the drudgery of detail, the minor manipulation of 
experiment, and in inciting them to work with zeal and per- 
sistence, society would but increase the stimulus afforded by 
their natural inclinations. Governmental activity in develop- 
ing the arts is but an extension of governmental activity in ap- 
plying them to production. Just as the nation should support 
and control vast industries whose sole object is the production 
of commodities ; so it should support and control a vast industry 
whose sole object is the production of improvements in the 
means of producing those commodities. 

It is obvious, however, that a governmental system of organ- 
ized and co-operating laboratories should not be a substitute for, 
but an addition to, such as are carried on by private individuals 
and institutions. Xeither private nor public monopoly of 
knowledge is desirable, because knowledge is something which 
is increased by division. In the transfer of knowledge, the gain 



L10 Till: POLITICS OF I'TILITY 

of one is not the loss of another, as in : of wraith. No 

or nation can Lose knowledge by giving it to others, and 
no man or n;ii ion ran have too much of it. 

< affiliated with the department of industrial imp:- 

ould be a body composed of trained technologists and 
. which may he called the National Hour, I of 
1 ts function should be the control of th< 
portion of the improvement fund (fund l>) of all industries. 

re the directors of an industry could undertake any ■_ 
enlargement or improvement involving a heavy drain on the 
improvement fund it would he necessary t<> obtain the approval 
of the hoard of improvement, or of a local hoard .-elected hv it. 
This would tend to insure all industries against excessh 
unwise expenditure a- a result of the zeal of the director class 
to reduce the producing time of commoditi 

The national board of improvement should be in general 
charge of advancing the industry of the nation, i con- 

trolling the expansion of manufacturing industries, it should 
superintend the exploration of the country by experts with a 
view to developing it- mineral and agricultural resources in 
conformity with a systematic and comprehensive policy of de- 
velopment, with a view to the interests of posterity. Thi 
tension of railroads, the erection of irrigation works, and the 
impr< : of navigation on scientific and maturely consid- 

ered principles, should be left in it- hands. In this way the hap- 
hazard, chaotic, wasteful, unrelated, unorganized and unsys- 
tematic development of private and conflicting interests would 

away with, ami the resources of the country presi 
for the benefit of its inhabitants, in-trad of being dissipated for 
the benefit of a lew land-grabbers and capitalists. Organization 
should take the place of disorganization in the preparatory de- 
ment of the country, a- in every other branch of industry. 
The organization of invention, embodying the principles of 
o-operation and division of Labor would produce results 
in t 1 - of improving the art- as great as it has in the 

mode of producing commodities. By organizing the manufac- 
ture of shoes, for example, one man to-day can turn out fifty 
or a hundred time- the product that he could two generations 
By similarly organizing the manufacture of improvements 

in tl e improvements will he turned out at an equally 

ted rate. When it is so plain that the emancipation of 

from poverty and toil depends upon this improvement, 



PANTOCKACY 111 

can common sense do less than undertake the means of accom- 
plishing it? 

Section (7) As a considerable portion of the ills of life are 
those resulting from the anticipation of evil, means of insuring 
the security of the future have always been sought by prudent 
men and communities. One of the chief objects of the insti- 
tution of property is to attain such security, and the various 
forms of insurance are provisions against future contingencies 
which operate to promote tranquillity of mind. As all human 
beings have a greater or less prospect of reaching old age, and 
outliving their capacity for systematic production, means which 
will secure to this period of life peaceful existence without 
labor are highly desirable. In a number of modern states — 
notably in Germany — the government has assumed the func- 
tion of providing this security to laborers, and it is a function 
which all governments should undertake. There are various 
forms of old age insurance, but they are all alike in principle, 
and when most of the laborers in a state are employed by the 
state itself, the application of the system is particularly simple. 
It should consist in withholding from each wage-earner a cer- 
tain small percentage of his monthly wage, and placing it to his 
credit ; the fund thus accumulated to be paid back to him when 
incapacitated from age, or to his heirs, should he not survive 
so long. Such a system would insure the country against all 
pauperism not resulting from defective mind or body, and each 
man could enjoy life as it passed without fear of the future, 
knowing that from his own industry a fund was accumulating 
which would secure his old age, and of which he could avail 
himself without the humiliating knowledge that he was de- 
pendent upon the community. This is a subject already well 
understood, and requires no extended treatment here. Its rela- 
tion to utility is obvious. Wot less obvious is the expediency 
of providing in a similar manner against sickness, accident, or 
other calamity, and such insurance the government should pro- 
vide. Whether it should be made compulsory or not may be 
open to debate — but the probabilities are that it should be. 

Section (8) The educational system of the United States and 
of most, if not all, nations is local in character and varies from 
place to place within the nation. In all countries, not archaic 
in political practice, education is provided by the community, the 
theory being that as education is vital to the interests of the 
community it should be provided by the community and not 
left in private hands. If experience proves the education thus 



L12 THE POLITICS OF III I.I I V 

rided by local communities to be adequate it may perhapa 
■ ft to them, hut in a thoroughly organized conditii 
•v n is probable thai a national system of education will 
ound preferable. It would he independent of local enter- 
local competence, and the nation would be justified in 
rtaking such a task, because in the absence quate 

education no nation can hope to attain the primary end <»f 
utility — a self-supporting community. To tin- attainment of 
this end, of course, any means is justifiable, and all obstacles to 
in attainment may justly be removed by deliberate act- of the 
state itself. 

Very 1 > r i< • tl \ I -hall attempt to outline the scope of a national 
•a of education which will embody the principles enunciated 
in Chapter 6, 1 not attempting to enter into details or methods of 
organization, hut confining attention to fundamentals. 

Assuming then that every community is provided with facili- 
ties for education, school-hquses, equipment, teachers, i 
quate to it- population — what essential changes in pn 

lucation should he introduced? They may he di- 
vided into changes of quantity and of kind. 

A- to quantity there are three alternatives open in the future. 
( l ) The nation can provide less education than at present. ( 2 ) 
same amount of education as at present. (3) More edu- 
cation than at present. I believe it safe to ; perience 
nothing is to he gained by Less education, and 
that if there is to be gain, it musl be by more. If education 
thus far has not accomplished all that might have been hoped, 
it is not because there is too much of it. hut too little. The 
fact is that the things which it is important for the members 

. to know cannot he quickly acquired. l\nowled_ 
reading, writing, and arithmetic, is not sufficient for the average 
man. The primary schools arf essentially mean- of imparting 
the notation of knowledge — the symbols or instrument* 

- condary schools should he provided wherein all 

ty si aid he tail-lit the USe of those swnhols 
in thinking. The youth of the nation should he taught how 
t«» apply them in ah aiatic instruction in how to 

apply them in the mosl typical and importanl 

aomic tastes Bhould he deliberately cultivated, ami the 
ait of ('(lucation of both kind- should he as gn 

can afford. And society cannot afford to pursue any parsimon- 
i ( u" The Economy of 1 [appii 



PANTOCKACY 113 

ious policy in regard to education. Eeckoned even in money 
cost ignorance is costly, while if its cost be reckoned in happiness 
it is ruinous. In the present condition of per capita wealth, 
every child in the country should have not less than an amount 
of schooling equivalent to a high-school course. This would be 
an expensive operation, and might require the withdrawal of 
some labor now expended in the development and dissipation 
of natural resources; but though an expensive policy it would 
be an economical one. Economy does not consist in spending 
little money — it consists in obtaining the equivalent of what 
money is spent — be it much or little. When by advance in the 
arts the per capita wealth increases there is no reason why 
every youth — male and female — in every civilized country, 
should not obtain an education superior to that provided by 
colleges of the present day. 

In asserting that every child in modern communities should 
receive an amount of schooling at least equivalent to that now 
received in a high school course I do not mean to imply that 
as much time need be consumed as at present. The same 
amount of information and training could be obtained with far 
less consumption of time. There is no reasonable excuse for 
keeping children in school a specified number of hours each 
day, independent of what they accomplish. This tends to make 
dullards of them by encouraging a drowsy, indifferent, diffused, 
condition of mind, inconsistent with that concentration which 
is essential to vigorous thought. Hence even if successful in 
mere acquisition of information the finished product of this 
system too often becomes 

" The bookful blockhead ignorantly read, 
With loads of learned lumber in his head." 

The same principle applicable to industry is applicable to 
education. Self-interest should be made to aid, instead of to 
oppose, the inculcation of knowledge. Definite tasks should be 
assigned each scholar each day, and when performed to the 
satisfaction of the teacher, he should be permitted his freedom. 
Perhaps a system of this kind would involve some inconveniences 
to the teacher, but it would cultivate quickness and concen- 
tration of mind in the scholar and provide an immediate 
incentive to application. As things are at present a student 
in any school below the college grade is compelled to dilly-dally 
in the school-room a certain number of hours each day whether 
he be the brightest or the dullest scholar there. It makes no 

8 



114 THE POLITIC B OF nihil Y 

difference whal I aot do, he must ibool the 

Eence his task — he drones 

with it. and his capacity for mental concentration 
use habits of mental diffusion are ei ed by 

i m. A premium should be put upon con- 
ration, an«! none would be more available or tend more to 
• rt study into a pleasure than to make the hours of study 
an inverse function of accomplishment, just as in industry, 
pantocratic system makes the hour.- of labor an inverse 
fun< production. 

This mighl uol be possible with the very lowest grade sch< 
• •• perpetual presence of a teacher is necessary, but in 
wh( iv written tests are possible such a system would not 
be difficult to devise. Suppose, for example, the first hour of 
each school day was devoted to written E the leg 

! the day before; the understanding being that t 1 
hours (A' the following day would be an inverse function o 

58 achieved in these examination-. The result would be 
that the brightest scholars would remain in school perhaps not 

than two hours a day, while the duller would remain l< 
and receive the more exclusive attention of the tei - This 
-t as it should he. The present system of holding all Bchol- 
. or near, the rate of advance possible to the dullest 
in the same number of hours of work, is nonsensical. The in- 
ive to concentrated and alert effort by Buch a Bystem would 
ater than that afforded by a weekly chromo, and it 
would lei the hours of play — a great desideratum with 

children of all ages. To read and mark so many written 
. day would perhaps be more work than could be exp 

her, hut it would not require a teacher to ^\^ it. A 

- of assistants consisting of more advanced students could 

divide the work between them at a trifling cosl to each. The 

result of such a Bystem, modified perhaps to meel particular 

ncies, would be a vast saving of time and labor, and would 

involve just as much or more acquisition of information and 

better mental training. It is nol my intention, however, 

to discuss p< ical methods, and the suggestion here given 

utioned incidentally, merely as an example of the applica- 

pantocratic principle of utilizing seli-interesi as a 

• ; \.' power. 

To apecify anything aboul amount of education without 

in afford little useful information. No 

amount of ed i< kind- would he o\' anv use to men. 



PANTOCKACY 115 

The Chinese system of education is adequate as to quantity, 
but is of a useless kind, consisting principally of memorizing 
the works of ancient writers. It is a mere training in tradition 
and tends to little more than mental ossification. A system of 
education essential to a self-supporting modern community 
should consist of two kinds — academic and technical. The 
first everyone should have, and it is desirable that all men 
should have more or less of the second also. 

The first function of academic education is to cultivate eco- 
nomic tastes, the love of the beautiful in nature and art, a 
taste for history, literature, and other fine arts, and the capacity 
to express thought and emotion in language. The second func- 
tion is to supply such information as is of universal interest — 
the knowledge of conventional s3 r mbols involved in reading and 
writing, geography, history, mathematics, the elements of physics 
and biology and the laws of health. These two functions are 
recognized to-day. Their relation to utility requires no ex- 
planation. An increase in the quantity of such studies, to- 
gether with the abolition of Greek and Latin in public schools, 
except as electives, could easily be made to bring these offices 
of education up to a standard sufficient for the purposes of an 
adequate system. The third, and not the least important, func* 
tion of academic education is the study of common sense, and 
this might well take the place of the study of the dead languages 
in the high school. The study of languages, other than the 
vernacular, is a waste of time unless it is thorough, and it is 
never thorough in any school below the college grade — except- 
ing of course in schools devoted to languages exclusively. Com- 
mon sense is a subject of universal application and universal 
interest, and its principles should be universally known, instead 
of universally unknown as at present. As heretofore shown, a 
knowledge of common sense includes a knowledge of (1) The 
nature of intelligibility, including the principles of the uni- 
versal symbolic mechanism of thought, in the absence of 
which, reasoning can not advance beyond the stage achieved by 
an intelligent animal. (2) The nature of truth, including the 
principles of logic; the modes by which valid are distinguished 
from invalid expectations or beliefs. (3) The nature of use- 
fulness, including the principles of morals ; the mode of dis- 
tinguishing degrees in the utility of acts. This knowledge does 
not arise spontaneously in every mind, as some persons appear 
to believe. If it did, disagreement between the judgments of 
men would be a rare occurrence. It requires to be deliberately 



L16 THE POU IMS OF ITIUTY 

taughl — dot is it easy to acquire. A- already shown, common 

e is a universal guide in common affairs, but in other 

pg n i- usually abandoned. To preveni this its principles 

ild be known. Common sense may be considered a branch 

chnology; in truth n is its foundation, and because oi this 

it should be included in an academic instead of confined 

aical education. The principles of logic arc the foundation 
of pure science; the principle- of morals of applied science; and 
without observing the principles of meaning, neither kind of 
ace would exisl at all. 

Dogmas should not be taught in schools. The dogmatic in- 
fection arising from family traditions is had enough. Eence 
no criterion of truth or of utility, not dependent upon the uni- 
versal structure of the mind should he recognized in public 
instruction. Logic and utilitarianism as herein expounded are, 
however, founded upon the structure of mind and are inde- 
pendent of the previous history of a/n/g mind. The fitnes 
teaching the principles of logic in public schools would per- 
haps he conceded; hut ahout the principles of morals there 
would be disagreement. No Bystem of moral- i- taught in any 
public school, and vet it is clear that nothing i- more important 
than a knowledge of the principles of morals. A system of 
morals should he taughl in the public schools, but it should not 
be a dogmatic system; it should not he the system of the Bap- 
tists, or the Catholics, or the dew-, or the laissez faire econo- 
mists, or the Mohammedans, or anv other system whose criteria. 
are dependent in any degree upon the accidents oi' history. The 
utilitarian system of morals i- not a dogmatic system, hut is a 
branch of common sense. And yet it cannol 1"' denied that 
there would he widespread opposition to the teaching of tins 
Bystem in the public schools — not because it is dogmatic, but 
because it is not dogmatic. A little examination, however, 
would show the opposition to he rather verbal than real. 

That the utilitarian system of morals i- founded upon real 
and vital distinctions in experience would not he denied by any 
person with mental capacity enough to comprehend it. Nor 
would there lie opposition to expressing these distinctions so 
Ion'': as such expression was confined to verbal symbols like 
"surplus of happiness," "utility," etc. Bui should the words 
"right" and "wrong" be employed, opposition would develop 
ace. These mod.- of spelling are consecrated \^ dogmatic 
purposes, and should they be given any definite meaninj 
universal interest, and that meaning taughl in the public schools, 



PANTOCRACY 117 

it would give much offense. It is probable therefore that, so 
far as public instruction goes, these terms, for a while at least, 
would have to be left in their present state of equivocality and 
uselessness, expressing nothing of importance to mankind, and 
yet appearing to do so. Nevertheless the distinction which we 
have expressed by these opposed terms could perhaps be brought 
out in public instruction by changing the spelling of the words. 
The meanings we have expressed by the words conscientious and 
unconscientious might, for example, be expressed by the words 
aequum and inaequum, and those for right and wrong by bonum 
and malum respectively. Certainly it is useful for all men to 
clearly apprehend the vital distinctions in experience which 
these words are designed to express, and so long as they are 
clearly apprehended, the sound or spelling of the words em- 
ployed to express them is of slight consequence. We might, if 
we pleased, employ the expressions x and not x, and y and not 
y for this purpose, and I should have pursued such a policy in 
this work, were it not that thought and the symbols of thought 
are so intimately related in the minds of men, that to employ a 
symbol of unfamiliar sound would have been equivalent to fail- 
ure in achieving familiarity of sense. Perhaps by some such 
device as suggested a complete code of common sense could 
be taught in public schools. The methods employed should be 
identical with those used in teaching mathematics. The prin- 
ciples and rules should first be explained. Examples, using ab- 
stract symbols should then be worked out by the student to 
familiarize him with the abstract application of the principles, 
and lastly examples of concrete application, particularly political 
application, should be worked out, to familiarize him with the 
concrete application. This is precisely the method employed 
in teaching algebra, which is a special branch of logic, and were 
a demand created, graded text books of common sense would be 
written through which the theory and practice of common sense 
could be made familiar to every person of competent under- 
standing. 

A people so trained would be capable of self-government in 
a degree unknown at the present time. They would be dogma 
and demagogue proof. They could not be led like sheep to the 
sacrifice, betrayed by their own ignorance into the hands of 
selfish tyrants or unselfish fools. They could no longer be 
deceived by the mere sound of words, whether used by the dis- 
honest demagogue, deliberately meaningless, or the political 
mystic — well meaning but unmeaning. With common sense 



us THE POLITICS OF (Tiuty 

thoroughly mastered by a whole people the road to hap- 
ould be eery easy. It is ignorance of common sense 
which ha . and .-till holds, the world in bondage. While 

this ignoran< ts it cannol be free, for it cannot adapt its 

ids. 
Moreover an educated populace would nol easily lose it- equi- 
librium. Appeal- to it- passions and prejudice- would have 
slighl ■ of success, and in such a society the occupation of 

1 ■ would be gone. Mob-rule is, if anything, more 

intolerable than autocratic rule, and it is a danger from which 
capitalism is never five. The only way to abolish the possibility 
of mob-rule is to abolish the material- out of which mobs are 
made, and the universality of education and of opportunity 
under pantocracy would accomplish precisely such a result. 
.Men are what their inheritance and education make them: and 
are classes in the community who are. or may become, 
nace to the stability of organized government, it i- because 
prevailing social system sets in operation causes which pro- 
duce them. Repression cannot forever five us from the danger 
of anarchy, hut tin 1 abolition of ignorance and poverty can. 
Of technical education little need he said, except that the 
o should provide trade schools and schools of technology 
•in the practice of the industrial art- should he taught. All 
men could not become thoroughly trained engineers, hut all 
could become proficienl in one or more trade- and lit to play 
ntly in the industrial mechanism. Certificates 
from schools should he accepted as guarante 

competence I various industrial department- of govem- 

•. and the kind of position a man inexperienced in actual 
iction would he fitted to apply for, would depend upon tho 
and amount of technical education he was able and willing 
re universal and thorough technical educa- 
tion, the greater the number ^\' skilled mechanic- and inventors 
per thousand of the population would he developed, and the 
if such, the more rapidly would the arts inl- 
ander their direct ion. The technical schools would thus he 
. cot alone of the commodity producing industries, hut of 
the invention producing industry, ami would augmenl the effi- 
[i entally the widespread study of Bcience 
required in technical education would develop the mosl economi- 
cal of tastes — the love of truth — of which modem science 
• • product. V At to the love of usefulness this is the loftiest 
and mosl satisfying of passions, and its Gratification reacts 



PANTOCRACY 119 

beneficently upon the whole community. The encouragement 
of such an intellectual passion by the organization of research 
and invention, together with the diffusion of scientific education 
by an organized system of technical schools, would develop a 
nation of investigators and technologists whose knowledge and 
control of the forces of nature would rapidly emancipate the 
world. We have the same reason for expecting such a result 
to follow the adoption of pantocracy as we have, in general, for 
expecting effect to follow cause. 

Some of the suggestions made in this section are doubtless too 
radical to be taken seriously at the present time, but as I am 
concerned neither with radicalism nor conservatism, but with 
common sense, I give them for what they are worth. At the 
present day the suggestion that all human beings should be 
taught the difference between right and wrong, for example, may 
sound radical but in the future it will probably appear con- 
servative. 

Having thus described in outline the system of pantocracy, 
let us now, following the same course as in Chapter 2, examine 
the presumable effect of such a system upon each of the ele- 
ments of happiness ; at the same time comparing them with the 
effects of the competitive system. In thus testing the mechan- 
ism of pantocracy it should be remarked that to compare it with 
a perfect mechanism — one which admitted of no criticism, 
theoretical or practical, would be idle. I do not claim that 
the mechanism of pantocracy is defectless, but I do claim that 
it is less defective than any of its alternatives. To compare it 
with its antithesis, the competitive system, will sufficiently indi- 
cate its status as compared with the related systems which w T e 
have discussed. 

First: How does pantocracy compare with competition in 
its effects upon the first element of happiness — the quality of 
the sentient agent? In Chapter 2 we have shown that compe- 
tition, if its ideals are realized, tends, through inheritance, to 
deteriorate the human breed by means of the survival of the 
incompetent, and that its principal educative tendency is toward 
the development of craft, dishonesty, and general egotism. 

In contrast to these, what effects would pantocracy presumably 
produce? Pantocracy claims to be a means of curing poverty 
— at any rate it will either cure it or it will not. Should it 
fail as completely as competition to cure it — an absurd sup- 
position — race deterioration would go on as under competition, 



L20 THE POLITICS OF DTIUTT 

but it would not be accelerated. On the other hand, should it 
succeed in curing poverty it would thereby suspend the operation 
of the law of the survival of the incompetent by bringing com- 
m and incompetent into the prosperous, educated, slow 
ling, class; i. e., it would cause the prudential restraint 
upon propagation to operate upon all natural classes of the popu- 
•i in-trad of upon the naturally competent alone This 
would open the way to a practical means of improving the 
human brood by some Buch method as that proposed by Galton 
on pi ■'.' It would be premature to discuss at this point 

the possible modes of stimulating artificial selection among 
human beings as a means of improving the brood. To cure 
poverty is to suspend the Law of Malthus, and it cannot be 
suspended without curing poverty. Moreover until that law is 
suspended, no efficient mode of improving the human brood can 
be suggested : but once the indefinite increase of population 
can be controlled, the most potent of all instruments for in- 
creasing the happiness of the world is placed within reach of 
humanity — the possibility of improving the sentient agent 
it-elf — an agent at present wretchedly adapted to its end — 
for man is not only weak, stupid, and egotistic, but he is 
thousands of times more sensitive to pain than to pleasure — all 
of which is precisely the reverse of what an efficient happiness 
producing mechanism should be. Pantocracy offers the oppor- 
tunity of changing such conditions, and of conferring upon 
posterity the unequalled blessing of an increasing superiority of 
parentage — a heritage greater than wealth or power — or even 
knowledge. Such would be the effect of pantocracy upon the 
factor of inheritan 

A.8 to education it would but extend and emphasize the - - 
cialistic practice of public education already so well begun. 
Much money is now expended by the state in education, but 
nol nearly enough. Realizing that the development of the 
human mind and character is indefinitely more important than 
the developmenl of the natural resources of a country, par- 
ticularly at this stage of human progress, pantocracy would, 
by the necessary taxation, deliberately divert money, that i- 
labor, which under capitalism is employed in development of the 
latter kind, to development of the former kind. 

8 -iid: [Jnder pantocracy the factor of adjustability during 
production ought to be higher than under competition. It is 

i Of I be I !( Q( >mj of 1 [appin< 



PANTOCRACY i2i 

true the work would be more intensive — while the men worked 
they would work faster — but it would not be the hopeless 
treadmill work of the present system. There would be an in- 
centive to it — it would be like an interesting game, for the 
duration of labor would be an inverse function of the speed of 
work. There would probably be no dawdling, but this would 
be a small loss, even assuming dawdling to be a source of pleas- 
ure, since the less dawdling the more play — the more hours of 
unhampered consumption. Moreover there would be hope in 
work under pantocracy ; not the kind of hope which partakes 
little of expectation, but expectant hope, since each year, each 
month even, would see the conditions of industry improve — 
there would be no fear of discharge, no insecurity of employ- 
ment to dread — each year would see an increase in the wages 
of the workmen, depending directly upon the rate of improve- 
ment in the arts and upon their own capacity to rise. Every 
wage-earner would have opportunity to reach the director class, 
independent of his social connections, since the more capable he 
showed himself, the more would it be to the interest of ap- 
pointing and confirming power alike, to elevate him to a posi- 
tion of responsibility. Thus hope would replace despondency, 
and all men, whether of exceptional talents or not, could antici- 
pate secure, peaceful and continually improving, conditions of 
employment. Moreover congenialty of employment would in 
most cases be assured through the use of preference numbers 
in assigning positions through the labor exchange ; and in those 
industries in which the work was inevitably uncongenial, there 
would be compensation in increased wages. Thus under pan- 
tocracy, wage-earners would have something better to look for- 
ward to during their work than sleeping well at night. They 
would have something to live for, and they would work will- 
ingly, knowing that the more willingly and efficiently they 
worked the more would life be worth living, for themselves and 
for others; whereas under the chaos of competition, rapid and 
efficient labor leads to no shortening of hours, and merely has- 
tens the inevitable day of overproduction and crisis, when, as 
a penalty of work only too well done, the laborer finds himself 
out of employment and reduced to want. No wonder the labor 
organizations under the unadjusted conditions of supply and 
demand prevalent under competition sometimes seek to limit 
production. It is simply a question of self-defense — a means 
of postponing the ever impending industrial crisis inseparable 
from the production-madness of capitalism. 



122 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

Adjustability during consumption is likewise promoted by 
pant( competition the desire for wealth can be 

gratified by only a small proportion of the population; with the 
greal majority it must remain ungratified ; and the conditions 
of it- attainment under that system are such that many, if not 

•. of those who attain it arc no better satisfied than I 
who remain poor. Thus the only useful purpose of wealth 
efeated in both cases. Pantocracy, however, solves the pro- 
Idem by making happiness independent of wealth. <>r rati' 
any quantity of wealth greater than is accessible to everyone in 
the community, aol defective in faculty. It provides that any 
greal accumulation of wealth is impossible, hut it insures hap- 
piness without such accumulation. Under do possible system 
can everyone in a community be wealthy, hut under a common- 
sense system all can he happy — and if happy they have no 
need of wealth. By bringing all able adult male- into the 
working class, and then, by the substitution ^\' machinery for 
men, converting the working (da-- into a leisure class, society 
►mpletely emancipated ; and as independence and happiness 
is to he had without wealth, money-lust and it- attendant ills 
will disappear. The desires of the people will be such as may 
be fulfilled under the condition- by which they find themselves 
surrounded. Success under competition means the accumula- 
tion of wealth, which i-, as we have pointed out. no more than 
the acquisition of mean- by which one sel of men are enabled 
to avail themselves of the Labor of another set. ruder compe- 
tition, in other word-, the success of one man is at the cosl of 
the failure of other men. and the greater the -nee.-- of one, 
the greater the failure of other- — this is the of com- 

petition. Under pantocracy, on the other hand, things are so 
devised that the only means by which an individual can attain 
is by benefiting society — hence the success of 0m 1 
mean- the success of all, and the greater the success of one, the 
greater the success of all — this i- the essence of pantoi 

re is jusl as much room at the top under pantocracy as 
under competition, hut as m08t men cannot reach the top, means 
must he provided for being happy even at tin 1 bottom if the 

of utility are to he met, and these means pantocracy - 
by practical and definite devices to provide. 

The nervous -train and anxiety inseparable from life under 

uncertainty of the competitive system would, under pantoc- 

by a justified tranquility of mind due to ample 

insui -i sickness, old age, or other source of inca- 



PANTOCRACY 123 

parity in an institution of practically perfect security — the 
government itself. Moreover the clanger to health involved in 
long hours, in unsanitary places of occupation, in the con- 
gestion and vice inseparable from great manufacturing centres 
under competition, in the ignorance and carelessness of the sub- 
merged and spawning millions which are the normal products 
of capitalism would, under pantocracy, disappear with the causes 
which produce them. The labors of the national medical 
laboratories, established for the sole purpose of diminishing and 
finally abolishing disease, would augment the efficacy of all these 
improved conditions, and in the end, the co-operative efforts of 
science would do away with ill health, as with all the other ills 
to which mortality is subject. 

Third: As to the effect of pantocracy on natural resources, 
we shall, as with competition, postpone specific consideration of 
the subject until we have examined the effect of our system 
upon the efficiency of consumption, and quantity of population. 

Fourth: Comparison of the effect of competition with that 
of pantocracy in promoting the use of machinery in the arts 
is of particular importance in our inquiry. This is deemed by 
its advocates the strongest point in the system of capitalistic 
competition, its strength arising from the stimulus afforded 
capitalists by the promise of profit to improve the arts and save 
the labor of men, thus providing the means of saving the ex- 
penditure required for their wages. This undoubted advantage, 
however, we discovered, to be offset by certain disadvantages. 
(1) The same stimulus which induces improvement in the arts 
of production, induces improvement in the arts of adulteration, 
substitution and misrepresentation. (2) The practice of throw- 
ing men out of employment through the introduction of ma- 
chinery, leaving them without employment for varying periods, 
and re-employing them under conditions no more advantageous 
as to hours of labor than before, prevents the improvement in 
the economy of consumption which ought to accompany im- 
provement in the economy of production, besides leading to over- 
production, crises, and. chaos. Pantocracy, on the other hand, 
retains all the advantages of competition, replacing the effective 
stimulus of profit by the no less effective stimulus of conditional 
compensation, at the same time eliminating its disadvantages 
by taking away temptation to adulteration, substitution, and 
misrepresentation, and utilizing machinery, not to deprive men 
of employment, but to save them labor, not to discharge them 
into a condition of non-production, but to permit them to dis- 



m THE POLH K 8 OF ttilitv 

:rom understimulated into overstimu] 
industrii activities of industry require it. a1 the 

time providing a channel whereby the change may be 
e quickly, easily, and conformably to the taste of the pro- 
apitalism a decrease in the operating 
an industry where a decrease is called for, is accomplished by 
onomic policy of forcing i of work- 

into a non-producing and underconsuming condition and 
throwing all the labor upon the remainder. Instead of tins 
foolish policy, pantocracy divides the labor among all the work- 
and permits the resulting decrease of w&gi - to cause the 
surplus Labor power to low spontaneously to industries where an 
- of operating force is called for. Moreover by fixed and 
uniform rules the hours of labor are reduced as the reduction 
in the producing time of commodities permits, and by the device 
embodied in the industrial coefficieni the price of commodities 
is lowered without the discharge of a single wage-earner; pro- 
ducer and consumer thus sharing immediately in the benefit 
Qg from improvement in the art- — and as the industrial 
dent, which determines in what ratio they shall share in 
said benefit, is fixed by the people themselves, no cause of com- 
plaint can arise from this source. Hence economy of con- 
sumption increases simultaneously with economy of production, 
and as demand and Bupply are adjusted by the department of 
output regulation, overproduction, or underconsumption, and 
sequently crises, cannot occur. 

If it be objected that conditional compensation can never he 

ive a stimulus as profit, since profit is so much greater 

in amount, we may reply that the degree of stimulus i\^^> not 

ipoi absolute, bul upon relative increase ^\' comp 
tion. T" a director whose salary i- $5 o 000 per year, an increase 
p (nr every per cent by which the average pro- 
ducing time of commodities is reduced, is as effective as an in- 
- • in dividei 11,000,000 a year would be to a capitalist 

■•• dividends were already $5,000,000. These enormous 
re rare; they practically always go to men who have 
little or nothing to do with the actual work of production, or 
even anization; and they are generally the reward of 

s or dishonesl speculation rather than of any imp' 

To permit these vasl sums to he withdrawn 

from mpensation of the wage earner- would defeat the 

\<> Buch withdrawal- are required, and the 

profit- which Mill and other economists have had in mind as 



PANTOCKACY 125 

effective stimulants are of no such dimensions. It is probable 
that conditional compensation, amounting in all to not more 
than one per cent on the capital invested in an industry, would 
provide more stimulus to improvement in the arts than the 
present profits — varying from nothing or less than nothing to 
three hundred per cent on the investment. There is much dis- 
cussion as to what a "fair rate " of profit is — a fair rate 
according to the dogmatic standard is, of course, a customary 
rate. The doctrine of utility enables us to comprehend this 
matter more clearly. The lowest rate of conditional compensa- 
tion which will keenly stimulate directors to reduce the pro- 
ducing time of commodities by substituting machinery for men 
is a fair rate — any lower rate is unfair because it will sensibly 
diminish the rate of improvement in the arts which society has 
a right to expect — any higher rate is unfair because it will 
produce inequality of distribution in wealth without any com- 
pensating advantage. 

Besides the stimulus to improvement in the arts and organiza- 
tion of industry provided by conditional compensation, pan- 
tocracy increases many times the efficiency of the means of 
accomplishing such improvements by the organization of inven- 
tion, and technical education. Thus the one advantage of com- 
petition over socialism (and that a temporary one) is by pan- 
tocracy, adopted, augmented, purified from its accompanying 
disadvantages, and made permanent, by the application of the 
ordinary methods of science in technology. 

One of the greatest gains in the mechanism of production 
which would be accomplished by the conversion of all socialized 
industries into public monopolies would be the co-ordination of 
effort effected. The lack of such co-ordination is the cause of 
the vast waste of labor under competition. The partial organi- 
zation of industry under private monopoly has done something 
toward abolishing this source of productive inefficiency. The 
complete organization of industry under public monopoly would 
do very much more. The present work of the world could thus 
be accomplished in less than half the time now required, and 
under a pantocratic system this saving of labor could be re- 
flected directly in a corresponding shortening of the working 
day. To appreciate the possibilities from this source of im- 
provement in the machinery of production, the twenty-second 
chapter of Edward Bellamy's "Looking Backward" should be 
read. 

Fifth : By its effect upon the interests of all classes of laborers, 



THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

pani would noi only make more effective the handling 

of the methods of production, bul it would solv [aboT 

probL : ' the laborer and of the director of 

ild be i T e only way in which the dire 

mal compensation would be to shorten the 
ring nominal v. tationary ; and to 

Labor means, by the principle we have enun- 
of commodities : this taking place in all 
real wages of every one in the com- 
munity. II • interests of director, wage-earner, and 
iical, the cause which has given rise to the 
mi would no longer exist. Lock-outs could not 
•• it would he in no one's power to discharg -earn- 
ers without charges of wilful incompetence. Strikes would not 
r, for against whom would an operating force strike? They 
would have to strike against a nation the industrial relations 
of which were in every part identical — they could not strike 
for lower hours, for they already work the minimum n 

ipply the demand — nor for higher wages, since these are 
by law according t<> definite principles, and not by the 
• I an employer. The genera] rate of wages of an in- 
dustry would be raised only as thai industry became under- 
supplied — hence dissatisfaction with the wages in a given in- 
dustry would automatically raise the wages therein, since the 
earners would prefer other industries, and thus indui 
'lion of undersupply. The transactions of all industries 
: be a matter of public record, there would he no secrecy 
Id be no profits eating up the wagi 
labor, and the principles governing the relation of wage earners 
to their employer — the cation — would be the same in all 
industri 3. Under such circumstances the unanimous verdict 
of public opinion would alone prevent strikes, assuming any 
ingenious enough to imagine a cause for them, and 
ould a Btrike occur, it would be immediately br 
- the whole nation -truck againsl it-elf. since striking 
would he voluntary discharge, and would he treated like any 

- the v ners n quired would be ob- 

labor exchai 

•ion of production would he againsl the interest of 

'• am! wage earner, lowering the conditional com- 

•, and lengthening the hours of labor of the 

ad — this would be enough to prevent it. It would be to 

the int' ' 'to work with zeal and enthusiasm, 



PANTOCRACY 127 

since the more efficiently he worked when he did work, the 
shorter would his hours be. For the same reason it would be to 
the interest of all to get the best men into places of responsi- 
bility. Similarly wage earner and director alike would be in- 
terested in handling the materials of production economically, 
and of minimizing the deterioration of plant, since every ex- 
pense would, by raising the price of the commodity produced, 
tend to the understimulation of the industry and the consequent 
fall of wages. Thus as a means of increasing the efficiency of 
production through stimulus of skill and interest in the use 
of machinery, pantocracy is immeasurably superior to com- 
petition. 

Applying now the auxiliary criterion of the adaptive prin- 
ciple another marked advantage is disclosed. Under capitalism, 
public utilities are placed in the control of persons whose inter- 
ests are exactly opposed to those of the public. The great multi- 
tude are, and must always be, both producers and consumers. 
As producers it is to their interest to have their working day 
shortened, and their real wages increased. As consumers it 
is to their interest to have prices fall, and to obtain the best 
products possible for the price paid. The interests of capi- 
talists are exactly the reverse. It is to their interest to lengthen 
the working day of their employees and to reduce their wages 
— it is to their interest to obtain the highest prices they can 
from all consumers, and to give them the poorest products 
possible for the price paid — for by all these means their profit 
will be increased. Under such conditions it is to be expected 
that capitalists will be forever oppressing both producer and 
consumer, and the expectation is not disappointed, for this is 
precisely what they do and always will do while human nature 
remains what it is. A community so stupid as to make the 
interests of those who control the desiderata upon which it 
depends for its happiness diametrically opposed to its own must 
expect to be oppressed — it puts a premium upon oppression, 
and it cannot escape the consequences of the law of human 
nature which it has invoked. It utilizes the adaptive principle 
to oppose, instead of to achieve, the end of utility. After pro- 
duction has become thoroughly socialized, society at last per- 
ceives its mistake — it sees that vested interests and public 
interests are antagonistic, and clumsily attempts to remedy mat- 
ters — not by abolishing the antagonism directly — but by at- 
tempting to nullify the effect of the positive adaptive principle 
already in operation, by superimposing upon it the effect of the 



THE POLITICS OF IT1LITV 

tive adaptive principle. It first make- it to the ini 
ipitaliste to oppress both producer and consumer; and then 
atens to punish them if they do bo. This is regulated 
talism — it is the pseudo-socialism which the dominant 
o] of politicians propose as a remedy for existing evils. 
On the other hand, pantocracy abolishes the primary antagonism 
of interest, and substitutes for it an identity, using the positive 
adaptive principle to attain the end of utility, thereby adapting 
il mechanism to human nature instead of Leaving it 
ssly anadapted, as at present. 
Sixth: As to the distribution of wealth — pantocracy pro- 
s for substantia] equality by doing away with the chief 
mean- provided by the capitalistic, and every other variety of 
competition, whereby inequality is attained. It will he no\ 

r, thai pantocracy does nol seek absolute equality in the 

distribution of wealth. Successful directors, that is, din 

who have been instrumental in permanently decreasing the 

hours of Labor and increasing the real wages of a community, 

for example, could accumulate considerable Fortunes through 

tin' conditional compensation received for their service to the 

community. They could not become multi-millionaires, hut 

• fortunes mighl become from 10 to loo time- a- great as 

thai of the average member of the community. Besides this, 

pantocracy provides for higher wages Tor skilled and experienced 

workers than for unskilled and inexperienced. This perhaps 

may he deemed a fault in the system, and were it devoid of 

compensating advantages, such a departure from equality would 

fault in any Bystem. Bui the equal distribution of wealth 

is a mean- — not an end, and if. as a means, it does not attain 

ml of utility a- successfully as some other specifiable mean-, 

it Bhould he abandoned in favor of that other mean-. 

proposition that wealth should he equally distributed i- 

true a- a general, but net a- a universal, proposition. This is 

why in constructing the pantocratic mechanism, I have departed, 

in -nmr degree, from means of completely equalizing wealth. 

It is important to efficiency of production that skilled workmen 

should he developed to fulfil certain productive functions. The 

acquisition of -kill, however, requires time ami trouble. Hence 

& there is Bome incentive i o, men will not take the 

I and time required to develop it. The higher pri< 

skilled labor under pantocracy therefore, is simply compensation 

for the hours of lab a1 is of lif. — spent in developing 

red to make nicn of more service to the commu- 



PANTOCRACY 129 

nity; and the inequality of wage involved is required by the 
general, though not universal, rule that the compensation for 
any given quantum of labor should be proportional to its labor 
cost. Eeasons of a similar kind justify the inequality of wealth 
involved in the institution of conditional compensation. By 
the stimulus it affords to improvement in the arts the com- 
munity will gain in happiness far more than it will lose through 
the departure from equality involved; and this is sufficient for 
the utilitarian. Knowing what end he seeks, he can adapt his 
means to attain it, unconfounded by confusion of a proximate 
with an ultimate end. 

Seventh : The means adopted by pantocracy of progressively 
increasing the indicative ratio as the arts improve have already 
been explained and their effect on this element of happiness is 
obvious. The theory of utility demands an increasing indica- 
tive ratio, and pantocracy provides definite means for supplying 
it. The effect of increasing the hours of leisure and at the 
same time increasing the real wages of all producers by the fall 
in the price of desiderata is to bring the whole population 
into the condition of an emancipated middle class, and this 
condition is that at which consumption at the point of maximum 
efficiency will occur. There would, under such circumstances, 
be no consumers in the zone of either under or overconsump- 
tion ; each average family would be self-sufficient, and the whole 
population self-supporting. Once this emancipated condition is 
obtained, however, it is probable that the actual indicative ratio 
would spontaneously diminish, because for the first time men 
would be brought into the condition where they would have not 
only the taste for pleasant forms of labor, but the education 
and freedom from unpleasant forms necessary to gratify it. 
Hence art, literature, music, and science, would be pursued, not 
by the few, but by the many. Not by one per cent, but by 
ninety-nine per cent of the population. As the necessity for 
consuming life in systematic and unpleasant labor in the " useful 
arts " diminished by the substitution of machinery for men, 
opportunity for consuming it in pleasant labor in the fine arts 
and the pursuit of the humanities would increase. Thus the 
avocation, instead of the vocation, would occupy the principal 
place in the life of each individual, spontaneous would replace 
compulsory labor, and the inversion of the indicative ratio would 
indicate a gain, instead of a loss, in the economy of happiness. 
Such at any rate would be the presumable result of the com- 
bined industrial and educative systems involved in pantocracy, 
9 



L30 THE POLITICS 01 UTILITY 

In vivid contrast to this common sense procedure consider 
that of capitalism. Instead of using Labor-saving - to 

Leisure of the producer and thus emancipate man- 
kind from Labor, it seeks to make the indicative ratio a Function 
of endurance only, and to make men work as long as they did 
when their Labor was qoI nearly so productive Even for the 
shortening of the working day already obtained Labor has had 
to struggle mightily, and were it not for the activity of Labor 
union-, men would now be working twelve and fourteen hou 
day — as they still do where competition is unrestricted. Mill, 
in his Principles of Political Economy says: " h Is question- 
able if all the mechanical inventions yet made have Lightened the 
day's toil of any human being." Such a statement is not true 
to-day — thanks to the activity of competition suppressing 
agencies — but what a commentary it is on the practomania of 
the capitalistic age. With the vast strides in industr 
Lasl century or two the productive power of the American 
Laborer is to-day, on the average, probably a hundred times 
greater than in colonial times — and yet his working day is 
only a little shorter. Of course it would ^r unwise to reduce 
the working day in the same proportion as the producing lime 
is diminished — this would prevent increase in the per capita 
rate of consumption — hut surely when the producing time has 
been diminished a hundred fold the working day mighl he cut 
down at Least three-quarters, and yet provide For a vast inci 
in the rate of consumption per capita. Had this been do: 
the past, the Laborer of to-day would not require to work more 
than four hours per day at the utmost, and vet live twenty 
times as well a- his forefathers of pre-revolutionary days. Thus 
capitalism throw away the great opportunity offered by 

ialized production. 

Eighth: In considering the effect thai the adoption - 

E pantocracy would have upon the eighth (dement of 
happiness — the quantity of the population, it- contrasl to com- 
petition is marked. Competition insures perpetual poverty, 
restricts the prudential restrain! upon propagation to the suc- 
cessful classes, and thus limit- population only by starvation, 
deteriorating the race ami wasting the resources of nature by 
making them Buppori an unhappy population. The extinction 
of the human race would thus achieve a better object than com- 
pel it ion. 

We have made the claim thai the adoption of a pantocratic 
Bystem would lead to the abolition of poverty and have given 



PANTOCRACY 131 

reasons in support of that claim, but whether this claim is just 
or not, it is certainly not too much to say that if pantocracy 
will not cure poverty then nothing will. Poverty is simply 
a name for a low rate of consumption per capita. If it is to 
be cured at all it must be by adopting such means that (1) 
The production per capita, per unit of time will be made to 
approach as near as possible to a maximum, and that (2) The 
wealth thus produced shall be well distributed. 

If focussing all the power represented in the stimulus of en- 
lightened self-interest, and all the knowledge and ingenuity 
furnished by organized scientific research and co-operative in- 
vention upon this single object cannot accomplish the result, 
then by what means can it be accomplished ? Certainly not by 
letting everything alone. Drifting can not cure poverty. If 
it could, it would have done so long ago, for mankind since its 
first advent on the earth, has done little else than drift. If 
through the operation of the law of increasing returns the ten- 
dency to increase the production per capita per unit of time 
can be made to offset the tendency of the law of diminishing 
returns to decrease it, then poverty can be cured. Otherwise 
it cannot be cured. Now, pantocracy stimulates the operation 
of the law of increasing returns in a degree impossible under 
any other system. Its whole construction is deliberately de- 
signed to stimulate it. Hence we say if pantocracy, or some 
variation of it embodying the same principles, cannot cure pov- 
erty then no system can. Pantocracy is primarily a means of 
applying science to the cure of poverty as the most pressing 
and universal ill of mankind, and as Lubbock says in this con- 
nection, "we must choose between science and suffering/' 
There is no other alternative. 

But once poverty is cured — and enlightenment substituted 
for ignorance by the diversion of human effort from the dissi- 
pation of natural resources to the development of man, conse- 
quences of transcendent import inevitably follow. The causes 
which now operate to restrict propagation in the well-to-do 
classes will operate to restrict it in all classes, since all classes 
will be well-to-do — the Law of Malthus will be suspended and 
deterioration of the breed checked in the manner noticed under 
section one. The eighth element of happiness can only be con- 
trolled by increasing the efficiency of consumption, and if un- 
controlled, the population will increase until it reaches a position 
of natural equilibrium. At this point its rate of production of 
misery approaches a maximum. 



189 THE POLITICS OF rriLlTY 

A pantocratic systo m will, of course, have the • ' dimin- 

ishing tlif resources of nature — any policy other than the i - 
tinction of humanity must have thai effect; but in the dissipa- 

of, and as a resull of it. happiness will be prodm 
instead of unhappiness, as tinder competition. 'There will 
something Instead of less than nothing to show for the resoui 
dissipated. Instead of utilizing the increased mean- of sub- 

rtence derived from improvement in the arts to increase the 
i! u 'iv numbers of an underconsuming population, pantocracy 
would utilize them to increase the consumption per capita until 
the average member of the community was consuming at the 
point of maximum efficiency, or as near that point as possil 
Thenceforth, increase in the population instead of being cheeked 
by starvation would be controlled by the prudence of the eman- 
cipated community itself, and maintained at such a rat 
keep the average member of the community consuming at the 
point of maximum efficiency. Thus the production-madn< 
inseparable from capitalism, which wastes alike the lives of the 
presenl generation and the substance of their posterity, would 
be replaced by the Banity of common sense. Labor would 

ognized for what it is — a means to an end, and not an end 
in itself — ami the end to which Labor is, or ought to be, the 
means would be recognized no less specifically. That end is 
not to develop and diminish nature's resources with maximum 

ed, bul to converl the potentiality of happiness resident in 

1 resources into actual happiness with maximum efficiency. 
'I I i 3e two contrasted views of the object of Labor represent the 
difference between the ideals of the commercial and of the utili- 
tarian schools of political economy — they represent the differ- 
between practomania and common sense. 

Thus if we tesl pantocracy by the same criteria whereby we 
competition, viz., its effect upon each ^\' the elements of 
separately, we discover thai the former stande 

• while the Latter stands none. Between them is all the dif- 

i ace between justice and injustice. Pantocracy is an adapted, 
competition an onadapted, means of attaining the end of utility, 

: a moment's consideration will serve to banish all surpri 

this result. Both competition and pantocracy are neither 
'i social mechanisms, to be deliberately em- 
ployed by Bociety to attain its end — viz. happiness. Comp - 

on is a mechanism which, speaking figuratively, nature em- 
ploys to attain her end — adaptability to survive — an object 
which has no particular relation to the objed of society, except 



PANTOCRACY 133 

that survival is a necessary element in both. Now no one pos- 
sessing common sense would expect a mechanism designed to 
produce one specified result to be adapted incidentally to pro- 
duce another one totally different from the first. No one would 
expect a nail making mechanism to be adapted to the manu- 
facture of washing soda. No more would any one with com- 
mon sense expect a mechanism designed to attain the end of 
nature to be adapted to attain the end of man — and it is not 
so adapted, as the tests we have applied demonstrate. Pantoc- 
racy, on the other hand, is a mechanism deliberately designed to 
produce that end, designed by the same methods of common 
sense that would be employed in designing a mechanism for the 
manufacture of nails or of washing soda. Hence it is only to 
be expected that it will be successful in meeting the very tests 
which have served as a guide to its construction. But while 
we should have reason to expect pantocracy to be a system 
adapted to attain the end of society — it would be a great mis- 
take to suppose it to be the only one, though doubtless it em- 
bodies the essential elements of any successful system. There 
is more than one system for making sulphuric acid, though all 
systems require the presence of the elements essential to that 
acid, viz., hydrogen, oxygen, and sulphur. Other political sys- 
tems differing in many details from pantocracy might be pro- 
posed, and were pantocracy once adopted the details of its opera- 
tion might turn out to be quite distinct from those I have sug- 
gested or might suggest. Hence I have not attempted to specify 
details, except so far as was necessary to demonstrate that the 
system is practical and will operate in a definite manner while 
the properties of nature and of human nature remain what 
they are. There are several forms of mechanism whereby the 
energy latent in steam may be converted into mechanical mo- 
tion, but all of them must take advantage of the properties of 
steam; and though several forms of mechanism may be pro- 
posed for converting the world's latent potentialities of happi- 
ness into actual happiness, all of them must take advantage of 
the properties of nature and of human nature in order to achieve 
success, and every social mechanism should be judged — just 
as a steam engine should be judged — strictly according to 
its adaptability to attain its end. 

Once more let me emphasize the dilemma in which society 
finds itself to-day. It finds that its activities are not self-sup- 
porting; that more unhappiness than happiness is produced 
by humanity; that the present system is a failure while human 



ri 1 1; POLITICS OF rnuTY 

Tint n r properties. In this Bituatio 

- and only three are open. (1) Euman nature may be 
3tem may be changed. (3) Both may 
is a prevalent Bchool of moralists, of whom 
- the type, who seek the first way out of the dilemma. 
claim that the trouble with the present situation is that 
themselves are at fault — that human nature must be 
altmvd before soci ity can produce a surplus of happiness, and 
they propose to change human nature by telling h to change, 
[f they are correct, the situation is indeed hopeless. The 
method of changing human nature they propose is not adapted 
to it- end. Preaching will do no more in the future than it 
has done in the past. Human nature lias not changed much 
during historic times, though it- customs have, and it' it is to 
he radically changed, changes will he necessary in that pan of 
social system which affects inheritance and education, for 
it is by these influences and these alone that human nature can 
1m- changed. Bui to adopt such changes would he to select the 
third way out of the dilemma, since it would be changing 
human nature by first changing the social system. It is obvious 
that it is by this route that pantocracy seeks a way out of the 
presenl unhappy situation. The reaction of the present system 
upon human nature results in misery. To change human na- 
ture i< hopeless — at least immediately — hence our only alter- 
native, if we would escape misery, is to change the system — and 
it is by a change in the social system that every advance in the 

ha- been made. The changes from religious intoleran 
religious tolerance, from slavery to free Labor, from aristocracy 
to democracy, have all been changes in the social system which 
have h'l't human nature intact, merely changing its customs, 
bness remains the dominant characteristic of organic be- 
. and it cannot be ignored in man. Pantocracy recognizes 
this, and instead of employing the great power of self in;- 

end of utility, as competition does, it employs it to 
accomplish that end. It seeks nol to destroy selfishness by tell- 
ing men to he <j-o<>d — that would be futile, but to divert it from 
competitive into anti-competitive channels. What good 

to t-'ll men t<> he good and they will he happy? Does any 
one seriously believe that propounding this platitude will make 
e proper wav is to make them happy, and 
. will he good. Although to abolish Belf-interesl is im- 
; . in change its mode of application to the social mechan- 

ism is not. Should we attach a dozen horses to a mired vehicle, 



PANTOCEACT 135 

and then let each pull in the direction in which he felt inclined, 
we should not accomplish much, but with precisely the same 
power we could pull the load out of the mire by making the horses 
all pull in one direction. In such a situation co-operation will 
accomplish what competition will not, and in hauling society 
out of the slough in which it is gradually sinking the same 
methods must be employed. To produce happiness, co-opera- 
tion is required — not the mere co-operation of good-will, but 
organized co-operation, amounting to a change in the social sys- 
tem. A convenient form of that organization I have already 
explained, and to the provisions therein for accomplishing the 
change desirable in human nature I need not again revert. 

It is a common claim that socialism cannot succeed because 
it is unadapted to human nature. Such a criticism applies with 
greater force to competition than to socialism. It is because 
competition as a means to happiness is so utterly unadapted to 
human nature that it is, and always has been, a failure. The 
only reason why the failure of competition is not more gen- 
erally recognized is that men, having no test by which to dis- 
tinguish success from failure, cannot tell the difference between 
the two even when they see it. Not knowing what society is, 
or ought to be, endeavoring to accomplish, they, of course, are 
unable to tell whether it is accomplished or not. Hence they 
mistake mere human activity, the movement of persons and 
things from one place to another on the earth's surface, for suc- 
cess. They gauge success by the activity of industry — by the 
mere motion of material bodies. They are in precisely the 
position of one who, entering a factory of the purpose of which 
he is ignorant, mistakes the motion of the countershafting for 
the production of output. He cannot tell whether or not the 
factory is accomplishing its purpose, because he does not know 
what its purpose is. It is futile for men to attempt the guidance 
of public policy who are ignorant of the direction in which 
public policy should lead. The output of a nation in bushels 
of grain, tons of pig iron, or coal, or steel rails, can tell us little 
or nothing about a nation's success, since, though these products 
may be necessary, they are not sufficient, conditions of happiness. 
And yet it is of such products that politicians perpetually prate. 
In this connection the commentary of Mill upon the folly of 
the mercantilists, who confused money with wealth, is peculiarly 
appropriate. He says: 



130 THE POLITICS of rnuTY 

u It often happens that the universal belief of one age of man- 
kind- - a belief from which no one was, nor without an extraordi- 
nary effort of genius and courage, covld at thai time be fr« — 
becomes to a subsequent age bo palpable an absurdity, that the 

ly difficulty then is to imagine how such a thing can ever 1 
appeared credible. It has bo happened with the doctrine that 
money is Bynonymous with wealth. The conceit seems too pre- 
»us to be thought of as a serious opinion. It looks like one 
of the crude fancies of childhood, instantly corrected by a word 
from any grown person. But lei no one feel confident thai he 
w.>uld hrfve escaped the delusion if he had lived at the time 
when it prevailed. 4 All the associations engendered by common 
life, and by the ordinary course of business, concurred in promot- 
ing it. Bo long as those associations were the only medium 
through which the subject was looked at, what we now think 
gross an absurdity seemed a truism. Once questioned, indeed, it 
was doomed; but no one was likely to think of questioning it 
whose mind had not become familiar with certain mode- of Btat- 
ing and of contemplating economical phenomena, which h. 
only found their way into the general understanding through the 
influence of Adam Smith and of his expositors." x 

Oh. ingenuous Mill — do you remember what the pot called 
the kettle? Jn this quotation, if the word "wealth" is sub- 
stituted for the word "money" and the word "happiness" for 
the word "wealth," we shall have a commentary whose striking 
application to the present system is incapable of happier ex- 
pression. Is it any more absurd to mistake money for wealth 
than to mistake wealth for happiness? [ncredible as to a sub- 
sequent age it will appear, those who guide the policy of modern 
states make this very mistake, apparently unconscious that they 
are but mercantilists who have changed the form of their folly. 
It was not surprising that after the adoption of a system of 

hange by mean- of money that the medium of exchanj 

\\\(\. by the worthy predecessors of modem economists, be 
mistaken for something having ultimate intrinsic value, and it 
was perhaps inevitable that between this vulgar error and the 
explicit recognition of happiness as alone possessing such a 
quality, an intermediate delusion should be cherished — the 
delusion thai wealth has ultimate intrinsic value. Since the 
laws of the evolution of human thought required this stop Adam 
th did the world a service in taking it. but it is calamitous 

I men thus deluded should be selected to guide the policy of 
nations, particularly as "all the associations engendered by 

1 Polii ical Economy, Chap. 1. 



fANTOCRACY 137 

common life, and by the ordinary course of business" concur 
in rendering them as blissfully oblivious of their preposterous 
situation as were the mercantile theorists of theirs. To be sure, 
happiness is recognized to-day as an incidental desideratum, as 
wealth was similarly recognized previous to the publication of 
the " Wealth of Nations," but incidental recognition will not 
do in the one case any more than in the other. Happiness must 
be recognized explicitly, as a definite product of the activity of 
society, expressible in definite units — a product having at any 
given time a definite magnitude, expressible by a definite in- 
tensity into a definite time interval, and increasable only by in- 
crease of that intensity or that time interval, or both — a prod- 
uct requiring cultivation by organized and directed effort — 
effort as organized and directed as that of a shoemaker in turn- 
ing out his shoes. We cannot too often insist that the only 
units in which the success or failure of society may be estimated 
are such as express quantity of happiness or unhappiness, and 
until we have determined the relation that wealth bears to hap- 
piness, the output of wealth can give us no more clue to the 
output of happiness than the weight of precious metal possessed 
by a state can give to its wealth. Could the people of our day 
and country learn this one lesson it would be worth all their 
other political knowledge combined, and they will learn it when 
common sense displaces common nonsense. 

It is the duty, and it should be the delight, of the economists 
of our time to purge their science of the archaic dogmas of 
Adam Smith, and to found it directly upon the foundation of 
ethics itself — namely, utility — the only sound foundation for 
any applied science. In so doing they wiil have accomplished for 
economics what Copernicus accomplished for astronomy — they 
will have replaced the geocentric system of commercialism with 
the heliocentric system of utilitarianism — they will have fixed 
the centre around which revolves the stupendous system of hu- 
man effort and human interest — not in the dead world of 
wealth, but in the living sun of happiness. 



CHAPTEB V 

Tin: n i:xt STEP 

To any proposal for substituting an uncustomary for a cus- 
tomary policy in the affairs of society tin 1 first objection, of 
course, will proceed from the ever prevailing conservatism of 
mankind — that ubiquitous form of fatalism whicb confounds 

inaction with prudence through misapprehension of the nature 
of a use-judgment. Assuming the law of causation, it is obvious 

that if with any given aet of a man or a nation the same natural 
causes are combined, the effect of the given act will always be 
the same; and we may assume that if the man or the nation is 
careful not to alter bis or its acts, then he or it may be assured 
that the effects thereof will, at any rate, not be worse in the 
future than they have been in the past. If the same natural 
causes are always combined with the same modes of human 
activity then conservatism may be caution. The difficulty is 
that they are not. By suspending change in their mode- of 
activity men do not BUSpend change in the modes of activity 
of nature. The inaction of men does not involve the inac- 
tion of nature, and it must not be forgotten that human nature 
is a part of nature, and as subject to the law of causation 
as any other part. The alleged attempt of the ostrich to 
escape danger by hiding its head in the sand is a mental opera- 
tion similar to the one we are criticizing. The ostrich appar- 
ently thinks that by suspending its own visual power- the visual 
powers of all creation will thereby be suspended, and similarly 
the conservative thinks that by suspending his own activity he 
will thereby suspend the activities of the rest of creation. His 
caution is that of the ostrich. Nature's policies art 4 usually 

accelerative and, as we have seen, they are usually maleficently 
accelerative. Eence man can counteract such acceleration only 

by changing his policies to meet it. He musl be radical in 
order to be cautious. Such caution is by the incautious con- 
servative deemed incaution, and he consistently protests against 
it. If these protests prevail and radical action IS postponed 

too long, calamity frequently follows, and this the conservative 

138 



THE NEXT STEP, 139 

attributes to radicalism instead of to its real cause — -conserva- 
tism. Thus Archbishop Whately justly remarks: 

" The mass of mankind are, in the serious concerns of life, 
wedded to what is established and customary; and when they make 
rash changes, this may often be explained by the too Jong post- 
ponement of the requisite changes; which allows (as in the case 
of the Reformation) evils to reach an intolerable height, before 
any remedy is thought of. And even then, the remedy is often 
so violently resisted by many, as to drive others into dangerous 
extremes. And when this occurs, we are triumphantly told that 
experience shows what mischievous excesses are caused by once 
beginning to innovate. ' I told you that if once you began to 
repair your house, you would have to pull it all down.' ' Yes ; 
but you told me wrong; for if I had begun sooner, the replacing 
of a few tiles might have sufficed. The mischief was, not in tak- 
ing down the first stone, but in letting it stand too long/ " 1 

Eevolutions are the result of conservatism. The English 
Revolution was caused by the conservatism of the House of 
Stuart, the American Revolution by the conservatism of the 
House of Hanover, and the French Revolution by the conserva- 
tism of the Bourbons. The way to avoid revolution is through 
radicalism; but although cautious policies are almost always 
radical, radical policies are not necessarily cautious. Obviously 
it is easy to suggest thousands of harmful radical policies. 
Now in the preceding chapter I have outlined a national policy, 
adoptable by any state which has attained a condition of civili- 
zation equivalent to that of Western Europe. So far as I am 
aware, only four general policies are proposed as alternatives. 
(1) Natural competition: (2) Artificial competition: (3) 
Pseudo-socialism: (4) Socialism: and the first is hardly a possi- 
ble alternative in the United States at the present stage of its 
development. Pantocracy is more radical than any of these ; that 
is, it departs more from prevailing policies. To the man whose 
judgment has no taint of fatalism, however, this will make no 
difference. All he will ask is: Is it or is it not, more useful 
than any of its alternatives? Is its end that of utility, and is 
it or is it not, better adapted than other suggested policies to 
that end? I have attempted, by noting its effect upon each of 
the elements of happiness, to show that it is. Were politics 
judged by the standards employed in science it would be difficult 
to doubt that the attempt had been successful; but with the 

i Elements of Logic. 



140 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

political standards at present prevailing there is a wide chasm 
establishment 01 a reasonable presumption and 

production of conviction, Bince wherever dogma prevails, 
conviction is not a function of reasonableness but of priority, 
and the suspension of this law of human cerebration is li- 
sted in one department of knowledge more than in an- 
il has besei the early stages of every science from m. 
matics to medicine, and politics will be no exception to tin 

It must, of course, be admitted that the only presumption thus 
far established in favor of the policy proposed is an ap 

and presumptions established apriori should not he depended 
when aposteriori evidence is obtainable. The ques 
is then, can aposteriori evidence of the operation of a pantoeratic 
system of the character desired he obtained, and if so, how? 

answer this question we have but to mark the procedure 
followed in those art- where the method of common sense all' 
prevails — where science has already been applied. Sup 
for example, a cautious cotton manufacturer should have sub- 
mitted to his attention the design of a mechanism which prom- 
ised apriori to he an improvement upon the prevailing method 
of cotton manufacturing. What would he do? Would he re- 
ject the scheme at once on the ground that it was not a cus- 
tomary mechanism and therefore useless? No: he might pursue 
such a policy if he were merely a conservative manufacturer, 
but not if he were a cautious one. Would he, on the other hand, 
immediately dismantle his whole plant and re-erect it equipped 
throughout with machinery identical with that called for in 
the design submitted to him? No; a cautious man would not 
pursue this policy unless the a/>ri<>ri evidence of su< 
overwhelming. lie would do what i sperienced manufac- 

turer, whether of cotton or anything else, would do — la 4 would 

try it on a small scale, approximating as closely as possibl 
conditions to be met on a large scale. That i-, he would ex- 
periment, and from the aposteriori evidence thus furnished 
would judge of the wisdom of installing tin 1 proposed mechanism 
on a large scale. This simple and Bafe procedure one 

adopted in all branches of applied technology, and it should 
ted in polil 
In proceeding toward any given goal we must proceed by 
. Imt it i- important that the steps should be in the direction 
of the goal. At any given -ta-_ r e o\' pr< - •' -re is always a 
step which will had more directly in the desired direction 
than any other, and if common sense is taken as our guide, we 



THE NEXT STEP 141 

may usually distinguish it. The next step in any progression 
is always the most important step at the moment it is to be 
taken, for if we make no mistake in each successive step as we 
are called upon to take it, we need not worry about the sum of 
the steps. Now we have ascertained what the goal of society 
ought to be — the maximum output of happiness — we have 
examined the several proposed routes whereby modern states, 
proceeding from the stage they have already attained, may seek 
that goal. They are: through competition, natural or arti- 
ficial : through pseudo-socialism : through socialism : through 
pantocraey. We have submitted strong evidence to show that 
of these routes, competition leads away from the goal, that 
pseudo-socialism either leads to private monopoly, a route which 
everyone acknowledges leads away from the goal, or into social- 
ism; that socialism leads toward the goal, but that pantocraey 
leads more directly to the goal than any of its alternatives. 
This much being ascertained the next step becomes clear — the 
apriori evidence here submitted should be supplemented by 
aposteriori evidence. Pantocraey should be tried on a small 
scale, the conditions of operation on a large scale being approxi- 
mated as closely as possible. In each of the several states which 
have reached the stage where this step is the next one to be 
taken the precise mode of taking it would have to be adapted 
to the conditions there prevailing. I shall not attempt the dis- 
cussion of these conditions in any other state than that of the 
United States of America, but the principles involved are of 
course adaptable to any other nation. 

Should the United States as a nation elect to experiment with 
the industrial application of pantocraey on a small scale it is 
obvious that it could be done without any alteration of her 
present relations with other nations ; but should she attempt to 
extend the system it is equally obvious that the policy of inter- 
national exchange of men and of commodities could easily be 
such as to interfere with, if not to upset, the whole system. The 
industrial reorganization of the country would involve a reor- 
ganization of its relations with other countries. Now it is 
important for our purpose to be able to see clearly, not only how 
pantocraey might be tried on a small scale in the United States, 
but to see no less clearly how it might be indefinitely extended, 
should experiment justify its extension. This can only be done 
by first showing how the relations of this country with others 
can be adjusted so as to prevent interference with the objects of 
pantocraey: and in order to show this it will be necessary to 



L43 THE POLITICS OF IT1LITY 

apply the principles of utility directly to the questions of immi- 
gration and of free trade and protection — to the international 

exchange of men and of commodities as it applies to America. 

Por the >ake of clearness I Bhall first discuss these quesl 
as if they were questions of patriotism alone. I Bhall make a 
provisional assumption that it is right to ignore the inn 
of all nation- except our own. Afterwards I shall show that 
the policies proposed are those demanded by humanitarianism 
a- well as patriotism. And first it should ho remarked that the 
:it policy of America is inconsistent with itself as a result 
of the dominance of capitalism. On the theory that the inter- 
>f Americans should be protected the United States adopts 
a policy of protection, protecting from foreign competition all 
products produced hero with one exception — labor. It is to 
the interest of the capitalist to protect all products except labor 
— hence it is the policy of the [Jnited States to do bo. Tims 
results the inconsistent policy of restricted trade in commodities 
hut free trade in Labor. The product of labor must pay an 
importation tariff, hut immigration is free or practical! 
Ir is not io the purpose to object that protection of commodities 
incidentally protects tin 4 labor that produces them. This is true, 
but were it the purpose of those who control the trade policy of 
the United States to protect labor they would do so by protect- 
ing it from immigration. It is not their purpose to do it and 
hence it is not done. The restriction of Chinese immigration 
18 a -op thrown to the labor element which only serves to make 
the inconsistency of the present policy the more glaring. Our 
country is to-day as completely capitalist-rid India is 

caste-ridden, or as mediaeval Europe was priest-ridden. 

In Chapter 6 we have asserted that the most important prob- 
ed* any country are those of race, and we have given there 
the reasons for bo asserting. Hence the most important prob- 
before the American people to-day are the negro problem, 
and the immigration problem, both of them involving the future 
of the race. The negro problem has been forced upon the pres- 
ent generation in America by the ignorance and Belfishnes 

ancestors. The country drifted into it, and consistently 
with the time honored theory of / lire, it is invited by 

enlightened publicists and politicians io drift out of it again. 
It is easier for a Bhip to drift on than off a lee shore, though 

navigators may claim that it will not always b 
Perhaps they are right — at any rate they should receive the 
support of their doctrinal brethren, the economists. When it 



THE NEXT STEP 143 

becomes as easy to drift to windward as it is to drift to leeward, 
then we shall drift out of the negro problem, but probably not 
before. It is an evil that will not "cure itself." I shall not 
attempt the discussion of the negro problem in this work. It 
requires separate treatment and should the occasion arise I may 
return to it. It may be remarked, however, that the policy of 
drift which permitted the immigration of the negro is practically 
the same to-day as it always has been. Whether it will give us 
other race problems is a question I shall not discuss, but if it 
does not it will not be to the credit of the nation's foresight. 
Men are taught through dear bought experience, but apparently 
dear bought experience cannot teach nations. It is bad enough 
to have to pass through the experience, but it is worse 
to learn nothing from it. Let us examine the immigration 
problem as a problem in simple common sense and see if a 
definite policy is not suggested by it. 

The question of immigration, as it applies to the United 
States, may most conveniently be discussed in two parts. (1) 
The effect of immigration upon the quality of the population of 
America. (2) The effect of immigration upon its quantity. 

And first as to quality. There are two current delusions 
which must be removed before this question can be intelligently 
understood. The first is that a race can be improved by educa- 
tion. The second is that a blend of several races produces a 
race superior to any of the elements of the blend. It has already 
been shown in Chapter 6 1 that as acquired characters are not 
inheritable the racial characteristics of immigrants cannot be 
changed either for better or worse by education. Hence I need 
not further consider the first delusion at this point. As to the 
second delusion — for it is a delusion — it apparently arises 
from the well-know r n fact that the repeated breeding together 
of consanguineous individuals frequently — though not always 
— results in deterioration, usually physical and sometimes men- 
tal. Opposed to this close-breeding or in-breeding, as it is 
called, is cross-breeding, which results from the mating of indi- 
viduals far removed from consanguinity. Cross-breeding of 
distinct varieties or races gives rise to mongrels or hybrids, and 
among breeders periodic cross-breeding is often employed to pre- 
vent local deterioration from in-breeding. Now if the American 
race were in any danger of deterioration from in-breeding the 
immigration of distinct races would be a good thing, but it is 

i Of The Economy of Happiness. 



144 I BE POLITICS 01 PTILITY 

in no auch danger. Deterioration from in-breeding, whether 
nimalfi or men is a Local phenomenon — it only occurs 
m small communities in which for many generations little or 
no intermarriage with outside communities has taken place. 
There are quite a number of such communities in New I 
land where everyone is a cousin to everyone else, and in some 
of them there are signs of sporadic deterioration. Where there 
is no circulation of the population, in-breeding is a threatening 
evil, l>ut with the improved facilities of communication of our 
day stagnant communities, already rare, will become rarer, and 
we as secure from other sources of race deterioration as 
we are from this one we should have no cause for complaint, 
[f the United states with a population of 80,000,000 requires 
immigration from other continents to save it from the ill- of 
in-breeding, then the world requires immigration from other 
planets to save it from the same ills. 

But besides being a means of preventing deterioration from 
in-breeding, cross-breeding is utilized by breeders to improve 
race-, and those who do not know just how it is utilized to that 
end may have acquired and spread the prevailing delusion that 
to blend race- necessarily improves them. Those familiar with 
the facts, of course, know better. What cross-breeding does 
accomplish is an increase of variability. Now the more varia- 
ble a species the more effectively can artificial selection be em- 
ployed in improving it ; hence crossing is employed by bre 
to obtain the variations from which to Belect. It they obtain 
the variations and then fail to make any selection they have 
accomplished nothing whatever. In other words, cross-breeding 
can only aid in the improvement of a race when it i< combined 
with -election — otherwise it is useless. Hence the blending 
of races caused by immigration may produce a more variable 
race, hut it affords no more presumption of improvement than 
of deterioration, because the only real instrument of race im- 
provement — selection — is not employed. It, as many quick 
judging authors of our day assume, cross-bred or mongrel races 
the best — then half breeds should always he superior to 
-• of the races from which they spring. It this l" so ex- 
celled results should he obtained from crossing Chinese, N"e- 
- and Malays with the Caucasian race, though observation 

cannot he said to confirm BUch a claim. 

e real facts aboui the cross-breeding of different r 
far as they relate to the immigration problem, may he sum- 
marized thus: It' two races of nun or other organisms — a 



THE BTEXT STEP 145 

and an infer B of practically equal 

numbers arc blended without selection the result.- will 

probably, though not certainly, be intermediate between them 
in char;;' That a race superior to A or inferior to J> 

might be -obtained b eanfi cannot be denied, since we are 

of variation; but so far as I am aware 
of either kind has 1, ordecL The chi 

against it in any given case are :eat. Whether the race 

Dm the ( . ould, as a race, be just 

half way them, would depend upon whether the two par- 

ent nu squally pre-potent. Unless we have information 

about the relative pre-potence of tl . that is, their rela- 

to transmit their characteristics, the assumption 
that the mongrel race will be half way between the parent races 
will be i robable than any other equally specific assump- 

tion, but that it will be superior to the inferior race and inferior 
to the superior race we may saf< line Of course, if the 

are unequal in number the mongrel race will tend to ap- 
proximate more closely in characteristics to the race which is 

numerous. The effect of crossing two races is well illus- 
trated in the breeding of mulattoes. As a race, mulattoes are 
intermediate in color between the parent races, the white and 
the black. The more white blood they have in them the whiter 
they are, the more black blood the blacker they are, as a rule. 
It would have been very surprising had the crossing of a white 
and a black race produced a mongrel race blacker than the black 
or whiter than the white one. Now what is true of color 
is, in general, true of all other characteristics of organisms, phys- 
ical and mental — they will tend, on the average, to be inter- 
mediate between those of the parents. This is not true of man 
alone, but of all organisms, and is thorough. 1 aized by 

biologists. Afi regards any given characteristic or aggregate 
of characteristics in respect to which two races differ, one race 
must be the superior of the other, since otherwise they would 
not differ. Now the chance of getting a race superior to the 
superior race from crossing two such races is the same as getting 
a race whiter than the white race from crossing the white and 
black races, i. e., it is very small indeed. The principle thus 
expounded as holding true of a cross between two ra' ially 

applicable to crosses between more than two. 

Having disposed of the current delusions on this subject, we 
may apply this organic law to the solution of the immigration 
problem, and if we care to make the comparison we shall find 

10 



in; THE politics OF I'TILITY 

that we have applied neither more nor Less than the simple rule 
-iiimon sense which every farmer applies to the breeding 
of his { corn or wheat. 

re are certain qualities desirable in the Americas race 
table by inheritance. The most essential are health, intelli- 
gence, altruism and will. They arc qualities which every per- 
BOn would wish to inherit from his parent- and transmit to his 
ring. Considering these qualities in the the 

American race, as at presenl constituted, p them, on the 

average, in a certain definite degree. Now, on the average, the 
immigrants at presenl coming to our shores in such numbers 
are, a- regards this aggregate of qualities, either ( 1 ) Superior 
to the American race, (2) Just equal to it, or (:)) Inferior to 
it. There is no fourth alternative. 

(1) If evidence that they are a superior race is adducible 
then, on the score of quality, there can he no criticism of immi- 
gration; indeed, the more of it the better, and the sooner the 
old race i< replaced by the new, as is at present occurring, the 
more fortunate it will be for the future of America and the 
world. Such evidence, however, has never been adduced and 
probably is not adducible. It is generally acknowledged that 
the American race is one of unusual capacity; that so far as 
intelligence and will is concerned at least, it takes high rank, 
and if this he true the chance that tin 1 average of a random 
immigration is its superior would not be great. Statists 
this vital matter are entirely wanting, nor would those relat- 

ing to the pauperism or literacy of the immigrant class com- 
pared with the natives he of any service in forming a judg- 
ment. Acquired characters being uninheritable the chano I 
generating a superior race from a community of paupers and 
illiterates real as from a community of the rich and edu- 

cated. The characteristics observable in any man or aggn 
of men arc due to inheritance and education combined, and 
due to education must first be eliminated before we may 
e of those due to inheritance. Hence to compare the 
nital or permanent qualities of two races we should com- 
pare representative aggregates thereof which have beeo sub- 

! to the Same amount and kind of education. Stal 
of crime, literacy, and capacity will then be ^i' value, hut not 

otherwise; jusl as in comparing two kind- ^\' Beed-corn we 

Compare them when -own in the same kind ^i' soil and 

subjected to the same influences of cultivation — otherwise we 
shall not he comparing the permanently transmissible qualities 



THE NEXT STEP 147 

of the seed, but merely these qualities as temporarily modified 
by cultivation. It is only when one race is very much superior 
to another that a marked discrepancy of education can- 
not disguise the fact. Individuals and communities of un- 
usual superiority are recognizable under any circumstances if 
subjected to careful inspection, but such inspection of our pres- 
ent class of immigrants has not revealed any unmistakable 
signs of superiority. We may then regard it as quite certain 
that the immigrant class have not, by this means, been shown 
to be the superiors of those at present inhabiting America. 

(2) The probability that the two races are exact equals is 
very remote indeed. It would be practically impossible that 
any two races whatever should be identical with regard to any 
qualities whatever. Hence this alternative need not be dis- 
cussed. 

(3) The probability that our immigrants are, on the average, 
the inferiors of the people at present inhabiting America is 
considerable, and were it necessary, evidence tending to estab- 
lish such a presumption might be presented. It is not neces- 
sary, however — hence we need not stop to discuss it. Fail- 
ure to adduce reasons for believing the incoming races superior 
to our own is sufficient to answer the question whose answer we 
seek. Simple common sense is all that is required. When a 
prudent farmer has a good and well proved variety of cattle, 
he will not permit them to breed promiscuously with any that 
may come along. The possibility that his breed might not be 
deteriorated by such a blend would not be sufficient for him — 
he would want a probability, and a very strong one, against de- 
terioration before he risked the permanent qualities of a breed 
already well above the average. Now the qualities of men are 
surely as important as those of cattle, and the prudence which 
every farmer exercises with respect to his herds should at least 
be equalled when the qualities of a human breed are in ques- 
tion. Is this asking too much of the intelligence and patri- 
otism of our law-givers? As Eobert Hunter says of the ques- 
tion of immigration: 

"It is a question of babies and birth-rates, and whatever de- 
cision is made regarding immigration, it is perforce a decision 
concerning the kind of children that shall be born. The decision 
for Congress to make consciously and deliberately is simply 
whether or not it is better for the world that the children of native 
parents should be born instead of the children of foreign parents. 



[AS THE POLH I< B OF UTILITY 

The making of the decision capnot be avoided It is made now, 
although unconsciously, and it is a decision against the children 

itive parents. . . . This is the race-suicide, the annihila- 
tion of our native stock, which unlimited immigration ; 

. us, none the less powerfully because it is gradually and 

Ithily done. The native Stock of America, ! 

advantages, freed by it- own efforts from oppression and the mis- 
ion, might have peopled the United S with 
the seventy millions which new inhabit it. It has not doi 
for the reason thai 'we cannot welcome an indefinite numl 
immigrants to cur Bhores without forbidding the existence of an 
indefinite number of children of native parents who might have 
hi < ii hern.' n ■ 

The problem of tlio statesman, so far as it relates to the 
establishment of an efficient race, is, indeed, practically tha 

the farmer bo far as it relates to the breeding of cattle or the 
selection of ><'«'d : but it is only in new countries like America 
and Australia that the condition- are such as to leave him 
much choice. It is in the power of the United States and Can- 
ada, for instance, to determine, in Large measure, the character 
of the population which shall people the area of North Ana 
ami by becoming the ancestors of its future inhabitants, irrevo- 
cably determine the future character of the American race. 
Although a factor totally ignored by political economists as 
pving no attention from those who control the policy of 
nation-, the factor of race is the most vital with which a na- 
tion ha- to deal — it is the factor which must finally determine 
destiny, for with an inferior population, an inefficient 
. no nation can do otherwise than decay; ami if it- < 
invol extinction of the race the sooner it decays the 

p. Acquired characters not being inheritable the charac- 
of the race which first occupies America will — unless 
their fecundity becomes impaired — remain the characteristics 
e American race forever. It is this which makes the mat- 
30 vital. Educational policies, financial policies, trad 
tariff policies, if found wanting, may ho altered; the ills which 
akes in judgment on such issues involve may he remedied 
by a change in policy; the evil is a temporary one only; hut it 
tally different with the policy of immigration, for it is by 
control of immigration ami by its intelligent restriction that 
i liaracter of the American race is to be determined, so far 
a- it rminable at this Btage in our history; and any mi-- 

i " Poverty," pp. 313, 314. 



THE NEXT STEP 149 

take in that policy now, can never be remedied by a change of 
policy in the future. Whatever ills are involved are irremedi- 
able ills — they are as permanent as the race itself. The pres- 
ent generation holds in its hands the fate of posterity, and by 
the policy it adopts the happiness of posterity will be, in great 
measure, determined. Never before in the history of the world 
has the opportunity been offered any state to deliberately con- 
struct a race, and as all the present unoccupied land areas are 
rapidly being populated it is probable that the opportunity 
will never be offered again. The knowledge of what means to 
adopt to attain the end, and the power to adopt those means are 
both available at the present time, and they never before have 
been available. Though in the past the power may have been 
available, the knowledge was not. That has only been acquired 
by relatively recent advances in the study of heredity. Nor 
are the means to be employed such as would be repugnant to 
the sentiment and customs of the community. The self-inter- 
est of a relatively few persons is opposed to their adoption. 
The responsibility is not a light one, nor can it be discharged 
by ignoring the evidence we have adduced or the presumptions 
established thereby. 

Having thus considered the probable effect of immigration 
upon the quality of the American population, let us turn to the 
effect upon its quantity. We have shown that if there is one 
thing which nations need not fear it is a paucity of popula- 
tion. Without any outside aid, nature will rapidly remedy any 
scarcity of population, if it needs remedying. The Law of 
Malthus requires no aid to stimulate its operation, for prac- 
tically every community is increasing in numbers in a geo- 
metrical progression toward natural equilibrium. The diffi- 
culty is, not how to increase the population, but how to keep 
it from increasing, and it is an ominous one. Adam Smith 
and his followers looked forward with dread to the condition 
of society at the period when it should have attained the so- 
called " stationary state " — the state of natural equilibrium ; 
but they could offer no remedy and no hope; since the cause 
which perpetually impels society toward that state with ever 
increasing acceleration, was deemed by them an unalterable law 
of nature. As already pointed out, that cause is competition, 
resulting in industrial chaos, unequal distribution of wealth, 
and the consequent over-propagation of the poorer classes; and 
it is no more unalterable than the law of nature which decrees 
that animals shall not wear clothes. Clothes are now worn by 



160 THE Politics OF UTILITY 

men in defiance of thai "law" and the law of competition ran 
be as successfully defied. Now immigration simply stimulates 
the operal ion of the Law of Malthus. The immigrants coming to 
QS ar»» poor and ignorant and hence arc very fast breeding, as 
arc all peoples in that condition. They crowd the cities, swamp 
the Labor market, lower the standard of living, and render hope- 
the task of increasing the rate of consumption per capita. 
To attempt taking the pressure of poverty off the population of 
America while Leaving the channel.- of immigration open would 
simply cause an increased How of population from foreign land- 
where such pressure is higher; for the law of equilibrium of 
populations in communication is similar to the law of equilib- 
rium of Liquids in communication; populations like liquids 
a common Level — the lowest they can find. Poverty is cer- 
tainly incurable with unrestricted immigration, and the con- 
tinuance of the present policy in America simply means that 
within a century or two we shall be in the condition of India 
and China — the simplest calculation proves it. (Seep. 49.) 

This brings us to the question of the international exchange 
of commodities — the question of protection and free trade — a 
matter slight in consequence compared with that of immigration, 
but essential to a clear comprehension of just how pantocracy 
would operate it' adopted as a national policy by the United 

It is certain that with free trade in commodities it could not 
be made to operate any more 1 successfully than with free trade 
in men. With commodities freely admitted into the United 
States from countries where pantocracy was not practised it is 
doubtful if any great success in the extension of that beneficent 
Bystem would be possible. Perhaps this assertion may be deemed 
a confession of weakness in the pantocratic Bystem. The dog- 
matic economist will be tempted to say: kk If pantocracy cannot 

hold its own with the present system in full and free competi- 
tion then it, is the inferior of the present Bystem, and is un- 
worthy of adoption." This is the typical attitude of those af- 
flicted with production-madness. It is a fact that, under the 
conditions named, pantocracy probably could not hold it< own 
with capitali-m in keeping down the money cost of commodities 
— though it would more than hold its own in keeping down their 
labor cost To make perfectly clear, even to a professional 
economist, tin- mode by which free trade w«>uld interfere with 
a pantocratic system, or any other Bystem designed to increase 

the economy of consumption, I shall disCUSS a Bpecific case. 



THE NEXT STEP 151 

Suppose the pantocratic system had been applied to the pro- 
duction of a given commodity in the United States for a number 
of years, and by the automatic operation of that system the 
hours of labor of the operatives engaged in producing it had 
been reduced to four a day, the price having fallen in proportion. 
Let us assume the average wage of the operatives to be $24.00 
a week. Assuming free trade in that community the question 
is — could an enterprising capitalist located let us say in Eu- 
rope, or in China, produce said commodity at a lower money 
cost than the American factories, and thus successfully compete 
with them. It is, of course, true that the national system of 
promoting invention under pantocracy would result in a much 
more perfect system of labor-saving machinery than any capi- 
talist, by his unaided efforts, could develop. But to an enter- 
prising capitalist this would prove no obstacle. He would simply 
keep himself informed concerning the machinery and meth- 
ods of production employed here. In his plants in Europe he 
would duplicate said machinery and methods, and then employ 
men at an average wage let us say of $12.00 a week, who would 
work twelve hours a day instead of four ; that is, he would pay 
16f cents per hour for his labor instead of $1.00 as here, just 
one-sixth as much. Free competition, of course, would permit 
him to get this cheap labor without difficulty. To make three 
men working four hours per day do work which one man working 
twelve hours a day might do, is, to be sure, utterly repugnant to 
the dogmatic economist ; he deems it an uneconomic proceeding. 
He thinks in this way because he has production-madness. To 
the utilitarian it appears quite economic, provided machinery 
has been so developed that an average of four hours of labor a 
day maintains a thoroughly self-supporting rate of consump- 
tion per capita. Any other policy would but lead to overpro- 
duction, and would be uneconomic however considered, because 
the object of utility is not the economic production of wealth, 
but the economic production of happiness. Production is for 
purposes of consumption, not consumption for purposes of 
production. It is uneconomic to waste the time of a happiness- 
producing mechanism in the production of anything but hap- 
piness so long as it is possible to devote its time to the manu- 
facture of that commodity — for happiness may be considered 
as a sort of commodity of commodities. One minute unneces- 
sarily employed in the production of anything else is just one 
minute wasted. 

Now it is altogether probable that the well paid, ambitious, 



L59 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

and happy laborers of Ami pica could do more work in an hour 
the ill paid and exhausted laborers of Europe could do in 
same time, but they could not do six times as much, and 
ould not compete with said ill paid laborers. We 
h.-ar it said that w.-ll paid labor ueed n<>t fear the com- 
petition of labor that is ill paid, because well paid Labor is, in 
the end, the cheapest. It is cheapest in misery — hut not in 
ey, and success in competition depends on low money cost 
— ma low labor cost. I fence under a competitive system, poorly 
paid labor is generally the cheapest. Were it not so. capitalists 
would refuse to pay low wages, and la 1 who charged most for 
hi- services would in every case be employed. It is unnee 
to remark that this condition of thin-- is not to 1 
by much searching. Even in t! eptional industries where 

the skill of the workman is such a critical factor that highly 
paid labor can more than hold its own with cheap labor, little 
i- gained by the community at large, since under condition- of 
free competition attempts to compete by parties employing 
cheap labor are continually made, and though in the end they 
may he unsuccessful they involve the perpetuation of those un- 
happy conditions of industry which it should be the object of 
society to avoid. 

In short the notion with which free traders in this country 
attempt to deceive themselves and others viz.: that the UE 
improved machinery in America would prevent deterioration in 
the standard of living here, is a delusion. It would do so only 
SO Ion-- a- capitalists, American or foreign, were so stupid a- not 
tn perceive that the use of the same machinery in Europe, where 
cheap labor is available, would yield a greater margin of profit 
than here where it i< not. Weil paid labor and improved ma- 
chinery may compete with ill paid labor and antiquated machin- 
ery, hut where cheap labor is superimposed upon imp:- 
machinery, the competition of well paid labor becomes imp 
hi.-. 

\< w by the Buperimposition of lahor at one-sixth the cosl of 
that required in America upon tin 1 same machinery there em- 
ployed the foreign competitor with pantocracy, although lie 
mighl ool he successful in lowering his wage-fund to one-c 

required in America, could probably lower it to one-quarter 
<>f that amount. This would enable him to undersell the Ameri- 
can factories, and how could those factories meet such competi- 
tion except by discharging nearly two-thirds of their emplo 
Cutting the v, the remainder in half, and extending their 



The next step iss 

hours of labor from four to twelve ; in other words, they would 
have to come down to the level of their competitors and lose all 
they had gained in economy of consumption. It might be that 
the cost of freightage would save them from coming quite to 
the level of their foreign competitors, or it might not, for the 
cost of freightage on the raw material might be such as to favor 
said competitors as much as that on the finished product opposed 
them. The absence of profit would also be in favor of the 
American producer, but the margin would be small at best and 
continually dwindling. To meet foreign competition the gen- 
eral lowering of wages, if such were required, would be of no con- 
sequence, since a general fall or rise of nominal wages does not 
affect real wages; but the discharge of men into the non-pro- 
ducing and non-consuming class, and the lengthening of the 
hours of labor would destroy the very economy of consumption 
which it is the object of pantocracy to promote, and the whole 
system w T ould be thrown into the chaos inseparable from com- 
petition; for free trade is but free competition between nations 
— it is as destructive of the end of utility as that between in- 
dividuals — and the policy of protection is an interference with 
it distinctly socialistic. It is a definite recognition of the 
beneficence of suppressed competition, and is a step in the right 
direction, a means of maintaining the economy of consumption 
in countries where it is not a minimum. Countries like China, 
where labor is the cheapest on earth, require no protection, but 
free trade as a policy of the United States would be calamitous 
even under our present system, and under pantocracy it would 
be impossible. The whole misunderstanding about free trade 
arises from mistaking wealth for happiness, and thinking in 
terms of money cost instead of in terms of labor cost. Thus 
arises the ridiculous notion that the cheapening of products is 
equally useful to a community whether it arises from exploita- 
tion of the sentient factor of production with an increase of 
labor cost, or of the non-sentient factor of production with a 
decrease thereof. To seek the elevation of the standard of living 
by the first method — to cheapen products by cheapening labor, 
is to emulate the dextrous feat of Baron Munchausen who pulled 
himself out of a bog by his boot-straps — and the ingenious 
economists who, by ignoring the distinction between the sentient 
and non-sentient factors of production, sanction this mode of 
rescuing society from the industrial slough in which it is mired, 
are entitled to the same meed of admiration which is due the not 



154 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

oious Munchausen, Both must be commended for their 

terity — of wit. 

Prom the foregoing consideration of the questions of immi- 
gration and protection the immediate policy of the United SI 
is plain, [mmigration Bhould noi only be restricted — it Bhould 
be prohibited. All immigrants of the laboring class who tend 
to swamp the labor market should be kept out as completely as 
the Chinese are now. An exclusion law operating for Bay ten 
years, and renewable at the end of that period, should b 
and rigidly enforced. If any great harm were coming to the 
country from this policy it would be evident within ten 3 
hut let it be distinctly -understood that delay in tin* development 
and dissipation of nature's resources is not a harm, but a benefit, 
in a country w] nomy of consumption is as wretched as 

that of the United States. What is the hurry about developing 
the resources of the country? They have existed here for a 
long time and they are not going to vanish spontaneously. The 
forests will not fly away — the ore deposits are not going to <ink 
into the inaccessible bowels of the earth — the elements of the 
Boil's fertility will not evaporate. Why not let them alone until 
they become assets of utility? They constitute potentiality 
great happiness — why not wait until those potentialities can be 
realized? Why should we hasten to develop them now when 
only their potentialities of unhappiness can be realized? By 
postponing their development a few years until the economy of 
consumption in this country is improved we can reap from these 
resources a vast harvest of happiness. Why not husband them 
till then? Prohibition of immigration may lead to the hus- 
bandry of the8e resources, but thi- i- just what is wanted. The 
object of utility is not merely to build towns — it is to build 

happy towns. It i- not sufficient to make the country support 
a population — it must be a happy population, and any rate of 
happiness production less than that involving maximum effi- 
ciency is uneconomic. 

Thus rendered consistent by the protection of labor, the g 
era! policy of protection should be continued, and as Boon as 

the nation began the manufacture of any commodity under a 
public monopoly the importation of that commodity should be 

thenceforth prohibited altogether. Thus interference with the 
ress of the nation through the importation of commodities 
or <-f men would be prevented. 

With such policies adopted, or definitely in view, the United 
ould enter upon experimentation with a pantocratic 



THE NEXT STEP 155 

system upon a small though conclusive scale; but a small scale 
of experiment would mean a large scale of production — for a 
small scale of production would not lead to conclusive results. 
Modern industry requires production on a large scale — and it 
derives its high economy therefrom, for only on a large scale 
can the division of labor and the extended use of machinery be 
introduced to advantage. The pantocratic system could be ap- 
plied most easily and simply to commodity producing industries 
— hence to these it should be first applied. A few typical, ex- 
tensively consumed, commodities should be selected, and experi- 
ment at first confined to these. Steel-making, meat-packing, 
coal-mining, cotton-growing, and perhaps lumbering, would be 
convenient and typical classes of industry to start with. Public 
monopoly would not be necessary at first, though perhaps in the 
case of coal mining it might be desirable even at first. The 
promptest mode of procedure would be to take one or more large 
plants of the first two named industries by right of eminent do- 
main, paying for them as for any condemned property. Through 
the exercise of the same right, suitable tracts of coal-mining and 
cotton-raising land should be acquired. The tracts for lumber- 
ing have already been acquired — they are the forest reserves, 
and by the extension of the same principle, tracts for other 
public purposes could, and should, be reserved. Having acquired 
the appropriate properties the government should assign them 
to the management of a definite department of government, 
called, let us say, the Department of Industry, either created for 
the purpose, or organized as a bureau of some department already 
in existence. Having conducted such statistical inquiries as are 
required to establish the various items of expense, the initial 
producing times of the various commodities, etc., the depart- 
ment of industry should draw up definite plans of procedure, 
fix the scale of wages and of conditional compensation, and 
enter upon the several industrial operations specified — or others 
equally appropriate — on a large scale ; the definite object being 
the reducing of hours of labor and the fall of prices by the 
introduction of improved machinery, social and material, and 
the practice of all economies of production other than the op- 
pression of the sentient factor. 

As these experimental applications of pantocracy would not 
simulate the consistent and fully grown system exactly certain 
allowances would have to be made, and certain expedients 
adopted, which would be unnecessary at a later stage. Thus the 
industrial coefficient should be arbitrarily fixed at a low value, 



i;.u THE POLITICS OF TT1LTTY 

the bulk of the benefit of curtailment of the producing time ac- 
cruing directly to the producer. The reasons for this arc ob- 
vious. ( 1 ) Such a policy would more rapidly abolish the army 
of unemployed. (2) Wore all industries conducted under a 
pantocratic system, then the Tall in price of commodities inci- 
dent thereto would be a fall in the price of most, or all, com- 
modities. Hence if the industrial coefficient were the same in 
all industries, a Large value thereof would be tolerable, since each 
producer would gain by the increase in the purchasing power 
of his wages what he failed io gain in the decrease of his hours 
of labor. Hut where only a lew industries are practising panto- 
cracy no such compensation to the producer is to be obtained. 
Bence the industrial coefficient should be low, and the bulk 
of the benefit of the system go to the producer. This would not 
materially interfere with the acquisition of the information 
which the experiment is designed to yield, since it is obvious that 
by such change in the industrial coefficient as the community 
might subsequently deem best the benefit of all economies of 
production could he distributed between producer and consumer 
in any desirable ratio. 

Another difference between such a local and a general system 

pantocracy would be the absence of any adequate substitute 

for the department of output regulation. This would be serious, 

and involve the Loss of some of the main benefits of the system. 

Bence to test this part of the system it would be desirable to 

tablish at leasl one public monopoly — say the coal mines — 
or perhaps the anthracite mines alone. With such an (experi- 
ment almost every feature of the Bystem could be thoroughly 
tested, and the conditions of general pantocracy simulated quite 

sely. 

In those experiments involving competition with private com- 
petitors, however, many features besides that of conditional 
compensation could be tested sufficiently for guidance in their 
ultimate conversion into public monopolies. Thus the ordinary 
channels of distribution could be used, and each industry could 
have its own Labor exchange — organized preferably under the 

national civil service bureau. Inspection of products would al80 

be easy. Experimental laboratories, stimulated by conditional 
compensation, should, without fail, be organized in every experi- 
mental industry. Should it care to protect itself by patents it is 

probable that thus equipped, the government would boob outstrip 
all it- competitors in lowering the price of commodities, even 
with the advantages in this respect which said competitors would 



THE NEXT STEP 157 

have in their liberty to oppress at will the sentient factor of pro- 
duction; since pantocracy would have in its favor compensating 
advantages more than equivalent thereto, such as freedom from 
labor troubles, enthusiasm, and zeal on the part of laborers and 
directors alike, and harmonious co-operation between them, a 
more rapid improvement in the machinery of industry, and the 
absence of any necessity to make a profit. Conditional com- 
pensation would not be comparable to profit, and would be no 
drain upon industry, first because it would only be slight com- 
pared with the amounts paid in normal dividends, and second 
because it would be proportional to, and conditional upon, im- 
provements in the arts. If these advantages of pantocracy over 
private enterprise were not sufficient the industrial ratio could 
be increased until they became so. Thus even without any defi- 
nite fiat government activity under pantocracy would, with little 
doubt, soon extend itself into public monopoly, because of the 
impossibility of successful competition by any private enterprise, 
and it would only need to fear foreign competition because of 
its cheap and indefinitely oppressible labor, and its power to 
adopt the machinery developed here without our consent. Of 
course the government might overcome this last difficulty, in 
some degree, by taking out foreign patents, but foreign patent 
laws could be changed at the will of foreign governments, and it 
would be cheaper and easier to forbid importation altogether, 
since it would accomplish precisely the same result in the end. 

The system of pantocracy would require to be adapted to each 
industry by careful trial, because every industry has conditions 
peculiar to itself, and the mode of applying the principles of pan- 
tocracy could only be learned experimentally. In the case of 
most commodity-producing industries the mode of application 
would be practically the same for all; hence in such industries 
relatively little experimentation would be required, but to agri- 
cultural industries whose activities fluctuate with the seasons, 
and to transportation, the adaptation of the system would be less 
easy, and would probably involve some preliminary failure. The 
initial stage in all industries, however, should be careful and con- 
clusive experimentation. This would thoroughly insure the 
community against calamity. 

Assuming the preliminary experimentation to be over, what 
should be the next step? How should the transfer from capi- 
talism to pantocracy, in the case of each industry, be accom- 
plished? How should themeans of production, now in the hands 
of private parties, be transferred to the people ? Four modes of 



158 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

accomplishing this may be suggested. (1) By confiscation. 
(2) By destructive competition. (3) By purchase. (4) By 
tdual sequestration. Let us examine the advantages of each 
of these mo 

(1) Confiscation is merely the expropriation of property by 
Btate without compensation to the owner or owners then 

It is a method familiar enough in time of war. but practically 
unknown at any other time. The Americas nation was founded 
upon such an act of confiscation, and by a similar act President 
I. acoln emancipated the slaves in 1863. It is, of course, uncon- 
stitutional under our system of government except as a war 
measure; few persons would sanction it, and any attempt by 
such a method to obtain control of the means of production 
would require a profound change of sentiment in the American 
people. It is hardly worth while therefore to discuss the matter 
or it< morality, and we shall pass to more practical suggestions. 

(2) Destructive competition is a method familiar in private 
industry and, as suggested on page 157 the government under a 

••in of pantocracy would possess such advantages over private 
competitor- that it could probably ruin them and acquire their 
property through bankruptcy proceedings. In order to do this, 
however, it might he necessary to increase the producing ratio 
more than is desirable. In opposition to the advantages of 
pantocracy private enterprise would have but one weapon — the 
oppression oi its wage earners — and it would be a difficult 
weapon to wield with labor organized as it is to-day. Indeed 
this mode of acquiring private property is as undesirable be- 
tween the government and private enterprise as it is between 
one private enterprise and another. It would be practically 
confiscation by competition, since the capitalist would be forced 
t<> part with his property without compensation, oi* at any rate, 
with slight compensation. It would involve, as it always in- 
vol\ it hardships and unnecessary suffering, and any 

or policy involving unnecessary Buffering must be unjust. Yet 
-t. men would consider competitive confiscation a just mode 

of acquiring the property of private individuals — and why — 

simply because it is a customary mode, ami wherever dogma pre- 
vails, custom determines justice. To ruin competitors by u fair " 
and free competition is a commonplace affair in business, and 
bene- is sanctioned by current morality, which in this case, a- in 
common sense, justifying the end by the means 
instead of the means by the end. A better method than the 
slow and painful oik' of competitive confiscation i- available. 



THE NEXT STEP 159 

(3) The method of acquisition by purchase is familiar and 
requires little comment. Applied to the acquisition of the means 
of production of the country it would almost of necessity take 
the form of bond issues. Title to the property to be taken would 
be transferred to the government by right of eminent domain — 
interest-bearing bonds of the value of said property would be 
issued in exchange, redeemable during a term of years — thirty, 
forty, fifty, or even more. At the end of the period, the bonds 
having been all redeemed, the property would belong to the gov- 
ernment without further payment of interest. Such a method of 
purchase should be as constitutional in the case of great prop- 
erties as it certainly is in the case of small properties. Never- 
theless, it contains elements of injustice which will become ap- 
parent by discussion of the fourth alternative. 

(4) Gradual sequestration might be of several kinds. I shall 
suggest two — either of which would presumably be preferable 
to the foregoing methods. These are (a) Acquisition by the 
issue of non-inheritable bonds, and (b) Acquisition by payment 
of diminishing interest. 

(a) Acquisition by the issue of non-inheritable bonds may be 
explained as follows: Title to the property should be secured, 
as in the case of simple purchase, by right of eminent domain, 
interest-bearing bonds of the value of the property should be 
issued in exchange, but these should be non-redeemable, non- 
transferable, and on the death of the holder should become void, 
the property represented by them reverting to the government. 
Thus by the simple expedient of making bonds issued in payment 
for the means of production non-inheritable said means of pro- 
duction would become the property of the people without further 
expense than that involved in the payment of a low rate of 
interest on the value of the property during the lifetime of the 
original bondholders. This expense should be carried by fund 
(a) (p. 85) and would be continually dwindling as more and 
more of the bonds were rendered void by the death of their 
holders, the advantage of the diminishing expense fund accruing 
to the community by the resulting fall in the price of com- 
modities. 

I am well aware that the method of acquisition here proposed 
will be criticized. The charge will doubtless be made that it is 
merely confiscation in the guise of purchase, and that it is an 
invasion of the sacred and inalienable rights of property. It 
certainly is an invasion of the sacred and inalienable right of 
bequest of property, but as that right is as non-existent as any 



1G0 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

other inalienable right of individuals no moral right whatever 
18 invaded. The so-called right of bequest is a privilege which 
time has altered into a right, or alleged right, and when such 
privileges are invaded history Bhows that there is always much 
igainst the invasion of rights. It is the old story — the 
sanction of tradition is substituted for the sanction of justice. 

list be admitted that the expedient proposed is uncustomary 
— it may even he unconstitutional — but it is not unjust. Let 
us look at the facts candidly. In substance they are as follows. 
Every particle of man-created capita] in this country has 
created by the labor of the people. Through the operation of the 
machinery of the capitalistic system, title to the capital so cr 
has become vested in a small class of the people. This ha- I 
accomplished through the accumulation of surplus value-. Now 
by t mi of purchase through redeemable bonds what is 

I of the people ? Nothing more nor less than this : that they 
buy hack the capital which they have themselves created from 
persons who, for the most part, had nothing whatever to do with 
its creation, and many of whom were not even born when it was 
created. This, we are told, is justice. But would Justice 1 ap- 
prove it? Clearly not. Very well then, it is not justice hut 
injustice 4 . Hence, it should not be tolerated by a just nation, nor 
advocated by a just man. 

I believe a little candid consideration will convince any rea- 
sonable man that some such restriction upon the accumulation of 
wealth as the one proposed will become necessary it the liberty 
of the people is to endure. With the present facilities of accu- 
mulation the unrestricted privilege of bequest and inheritance 
simply means that, in two or three generations at the mosl 
practically all the wealth of the country will be in the ham 
a few hundred families, or perhaps a few score families. The 
people will he practically slaves; they will be in the condition 
of the people <«f Attica at the accession of Solon — held in 
bondage by the money lenders. Solon freed his country by 
abrogating the "inalienable right" of the Athenian capitalists 
to hold their creditors in servitude, and there can he no doubt 
that the "inalienable right" of unrestricted bequest will have 
to he abrogated if the people of this country are to be anything 
better than bondsmen. A society like our own. divided into 
classes on the basis of wealth, is unstable. It i< but a special 

of a nation ''half slave and half \'n>r" or rather nine-tenths 
slave and one-tenth free. Wealth is the foundation of power, 
and ' istory proves thai do class has ever possessed power without 



THE NEXT STEP 161 

using it to further its own ends. This can only mean that the 
inequality of wealth in a society where there is no restriction 
upon accumulation will become greater and greater until the 
masses either become permanent bondsmen, or revolt and re- 
establish equality by confiscation, and the process will repeat 
itself until some restriction is placed upon accumulation, for 
otherwise the establishment of equality is not permanent. 

Thus the acquisition of the means of production by non-in- 
heritable bonds would accomplish two useful objects at the same 
time. It would place the ownership of public utilities in the 
hands of the public, where alone they belong, and it would allay 
the congestion of wealth which menaces the life of the republic. 
Abrogation of the right to bequeath property in means of pro- 
duction, such as is here proposed, leaves intact, of course, the 
right to bequeath other kinds of property. It is private prop- 
erty in public utilities alone which the expedient proposed is de- 
signed to abolish. 

(b) Acquisition by payment of diminishing interest is an 
alternative means of acquiring public utilities which would have 
some advantages over the preceding, and would perhaps be less 
disturbing to the business interests of the country during the 
period of transition. The nature of this means may be indicated 
by the following example: Suppose the purchasing price of a 
given plant to be A dollars. For the first three years the gov- 
ernment would pay interest on A dollars ; for the next three on 
ninety per cent of A dollars ; for the following three on eighty 
per cent of A dollars, and so on. Carrying out this principle, 
title to the property would become completely vested in the 
government at the expiration of thirty years; the transition 
from private to public ownership being immediate so far as con- 
cerned operation, but gradual so far as concerned the division 
of profit. In the beginning profit, represented by interest on 
the full value of the property, would be given the original owners : 
at the end this would all accrue to the public in the form of 
diminished prices : in the intermediate stages it would be divided 
between the original owners and the public. By a device of this 
general character, or of that involved in the issue of non-inherita- 
ble bonds, the means of production could be gradually restored 
to the community which created them without any violent dis- 
turbance of private interests. 

It should not be forgotten, however, that by whatever mode 
the acquisition of the public utilities of the United States might 
or may be accomplished it is not of necessity permanent. In 



162 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

acquiring control of the industries in which their welfare is 
bound up the people will have done nothing irrevocable. Thev 
can always reverse their action if they conclude they have made 
a mistake. Many earnest persons believe that the cessation of 
individual ownership in the means of production would Leave 
the people in a hopeless, ambitionless, and dejected condition — 
would deprive them of initiative and thrift. He who lias care- 
fully considered what has preceded in this work will, I believe, 
be unable to accept such a view. It is, indeed, diametrically 
opposed to the truth, and arises from the confusion of socialism 
in production with socialism in consumption. The present 
tern it is which is destructive of ambition and initiative — not 
indeed completely so, but tending to confine these traits to a 
favored few. The great mass of the industrial army must always 
consist of laborers engaged in the execution — not in the direc- 
tion of the tasks of the world, just as the great mass of an ordi- 
nary army must consist of privates — very few can be colonels 
and generals. Hence a system which would make mankind hope- 
ful must hold out hope to the executive laborers — not alone the 
hope of rising into the directive class; this must in the very 
nature of things be delusive to the average man, and is indeed 
conspicuously so under the present system — but it must hold 
out the hope of happiness to the wage-earner while lie remains 
a wage-earner — it must render him a joyous being whether or 
no he rises into the directing class. This, pantocracv is desi 
to accomplish, which capitalism is not. But if. under the former 
system, any particular acquisition of a public utility by the public 
should turn out to be a mistake, or seem to do so — if it should 
tend to diminish hope and stifle ambition — the people could 
readily reverse their action if they desired to; and this would 
be particularly easy provided they had established the essentially 
democratic principle of direct legislation. A referendum vote 
would suffice to put any public utility back into the hands of 
private 1 capitalists. For example, suppose our people at the 
ml time had power of direct legislation, and concluded that 
the public ownership of the Post Office was making them ambi- 
tionless and dejected. They could easily, by means of the refer- 
endum, direct the authorities to transfer the whole system to 
capitalists. This mighl be done in any one of a variety of ways. 
The government mighl agree to accept the bonds of a syndicate 
formed to conduct the post office business of the country, and 
experience proves that it would probably not be difficult to find 

a syndicate willing to Berve the public in such a capacity. On 






THE NEXT STEP 163 

receipt of properly guaranteed bonds the post office property 
would be turned over to the syndicate, and they would proceed 
to conduct it in such a manner as would be most profitable to 
themselves, that is, by instituting the normal process of giving as 
little to, and getting as much from, the public as possible. In 
this way perhaps the ambition of the people might be revived, and 
their dejection turned into hope, and the same course could be 
pursued with any public utility which the nation might acquire 
under pantocracy. Thus the people would be fully guaranteed 
against the dismal and dejected conditions which certain un- 
observant theorists are convinced must inhere in freedom from 
capitalistic control of industry, and could proceed with the suc- 
cessive aquisicion of the various utilities now in private hands 
with full consciousness that the old conditions could be re-estab- 
lished in any particular case, should a careful trial show such a 
course to be desirable. 

The centralization so dreaded by political dogmatists is dan- 
gerous only under oligarchical conditions. Direct legislation 
would render it innocuous. The remedy for present evils is not 
less centralization combined with industrial oligarchy ; it is more 
centralization combined with industrial democracy. We should 
substitute direct for indirect control of the people, by this means 
avoiding the dangers not only of capitalistic, but of bureaucratic, 
despotism. 

We have thus outlined a policy suggested solely by the princi- 
ples of utility which, if adopted, would tend to bring the United 
States as a nation into a condition of self-support, and make it 
the first nation in the history of the world to attain that con- 
dition. The beneficent effects of the policy would not be fully 
felt by the present generation, for the progress of science, though 
rapid, cannot undo the evil of a thousand generations of dogma 
in one of common sense; but if we will put ourselves in the 
place of our posterity, we shall discover that in adopting the 
policy of common sense we have adopted the Golden Eule — we 
shall have done to our posterity as we would that our ancestors 
had done unto theirs. For, had we the power to choose, under 
what conditions would we desire to be brought into the world, 
and what conditions would we desire to find there? Would we 
desire ancestry of a superior or of an inferior race ? Surely we 
would not desire an inferior ancestry. Very well then — if 
holding the fate of posterity in our hands we fail to make such 
provision as is supplied us by the current knowledge of heredity 
to insure to our posterity an undegenerate ancestry, we have 



104 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

violated the Golden Rule, and have failed in our duty to the 
coming generations. Would wo desire to be born into an 01 
populated world the cream of w] - turces had been dissi- 

pated by our ancestors, and take up the struggle Eoi 

with nature and with man after the first had been render 
niggardly by " development M and the secor ' desperate by want; 
or would we desire to find the population adapted to its means 
of support by a low birth rate instead of a high death rate: to 
find the resources of nature husbanded and rendered accessible 
by Bcience, and the interests of men identical with, instead of 
opposed to. our own? There can be no doubt that the second 
of these alternatives would he selected by any sane man. Very 
well then — the Golden Eule requires that we adopt the means 
necessary to attain such ends, and common sense alone can dis- 
tinguish them. 

Let no man repeat the stale objection that, as this world 
is a school of adversity, it is good that men should be born 
to pain — that suffering and hardship arc 1 better than happi- 
ness and ease — if he is sincere, let him wear a hair shirt 
— that act will -peak louder than many words. His consistent 
predecessor, the ascetic of the Middle Ages, thus proved his ad- 
herence to the moral code of unhappiness, and as much should 
he required of the modern ascetic before we accept his preaching 
as sincere. If this world is indeed a school of adversity — if 
those who preach the duty of unhappiness are sufficiently in the 
confidence of Omnipotence to know that it is I lis design that 
we he unhappy here, then why do they attempt to thwart that 

sign by preaching and practising charity? Why do they labor 
to relieve the poor and unfortunate, and thus render less ef- 

live the moral discipline which it is the object of life to sup- 
pi;,? If they practised what they preached they would seek to 
tensify, and not to relieve, the suffering of mankind. They 
do not practise what they preach because their heart is a better 

ide than their head, and the morality of their instincts repudi- 

- the immorality of their theology. It i< a triumph of com- 
mon sense over Bophistry. If once we accord men the right to 
charity we cannot withhold from them the right to justice; and 
were justice done, charity would be superfluous. The confusion 
of this whole matter would bo abolished if he who preaches the 

ry of suffering and its power to develop character would but 

distinguish between Belf-sacrifice with an object, and Belf-sacrif 
without an object; if he would but recognize that character i- 

iiot an end. hut a means to ; m K^n^. The modern a- not 



THE NEXT STEP 165 

a follower of Christ, for Christ was a utilitarian, and practised 
what He preached. His object was — not to cause men suffer- 
ing, but to save them from it. He recognized that conscience 
must first be guided by right before the conduct of men can 
safely be guided by conscience. Had He been an intuitionist, 
adopting conscience as a guide, He might just as well have 
accepted the moral code He found, instead of erecting a new 
one; for if conscientiousness is all that is required of men it 
can be secured as well by adherence to one code of morals as to 
another. A man can be as conscientious about burning his 
fellow-man alive as about curing his sickness or relieving his 
poverty. Let all such confusion about the morality of suffering 
be repudiated once for ail — pain is an unmitigated evil, and its 
causes are evils — sickness is an evil, selfishness is an evil, ig- 
norance is an evil, poverty is an evil, only because they are causes 
of suffering, and pain is only to be deliberately sought, or de- 
liberately tolerated, when it is a presumable means to an ultimate 
gain in happiness. 

The policy herein suggested for the American nation has thus 
far been supported only on grounds of patriotism, and were 
custom our guide, such grounds would be sufficient. Few, if any, 
nations determine their policies by the presumable effects thereof 
upon other nations, but utility requires a broader morality than 
this. It requires the application of the Golden Eule as between 
one nation and another on the same ground that it requires the 
application of the same rule as between one generation and an- 
other. Therefore, we must justify our policy on humanitarian 
grounds as well as on patriotic grounds. 

There is a school of patriotism more or less popular which 
teaches that a man owes to his country a duty which he owes 
to no other aggregate of the human race, and that he should 
render service to the constituted authorities thereof, whatever 
policies they may choose to pursue. The motto of this school 
is "My country, right or wrong." Had it been the motto of 
Washington and his compatriots the United States would still 
be a part of the British Empire. The particular aggregate of 
men which constitutes a nation is a matter of the merest acci- 
dent. Since the first confederation of the thirteen colonies at 
the time of the American Eevolution it has been a matter of 
debate whether the United States is one nation, or an aggregate 
of nations, as its name implies. At the time of the Civil War, 
the North held to the former view, the South to the latter, and 
those who contended that each state was sovereign and inde- 



m THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

pendent and entitled to their first allegiance were as patriotic 

as those who contended lor the opposite view. Indeed, the pa- 
triotism whose dictum is "My country, righl or wrong" is hut 
one degree of egotism, for if my country right or wrong, why 
not my Btate right or wrong, if my state right or wrong, why 
imt my town righl or wrong, if my town right or wrong, why not 
my neighborhood right or wrong, if my neighborhood right or 
wrong, why not my family right or wrong, if my family right or 
wrong, why not my great-uncle right or wrong, if my great- 
uncle right or wrong, why not myself Tight or wrong? If patri- 
otism, why not phyliotism, if phyliotism, why not oeciotism, if 

liotism, why not egotism ? It would seem as if he whose only 
reason for judging a nation worthy of service and support was 
because he happened to he a citizen thereof was guilty of the 
apotheosis of egotism. The utilitarian cannot sanction such a 
new ; he has hut one test, and judges of the value of a nation by 
the same standard as he judges of the value of everything else — 
from a toothpick to a code of morals — that nation is the best 
which contributes most to the happiness of humanity, and the 
ambition of the true patriot is to make his country occupy that 
proud position. Now I claim that the adoption of a pantocratic 
policy would make the United States in the future, what she 
has been in the past, the greatest contributor to the happiness 
of humanity of any nation on earth; and that, unless she aban- 
don- her present capitalistic Bystem, and adopts a policy of con- 
sistent democracy, she will cease to be the greatest nation of the 
world, and other state-, imitating her past instead of her present 
example, will supersede her in that position. 

T<> justify the claim thus made it will he sufficient to expound 
the utilitarian theory of free trade as applied to nations like 
the United States. It is quite distinct from the laissez faire 
theory of tree trade, and has an exactly opposite effect upon the 
happiness of humanity. 

We have asserted that the United States, on assuming the pro- 
duction of any commodity, should prohibit the importation of 
that commodity into the country. This is certainly not much 
like Five trade and the free trader would criticize it. He would 
argue thus: Nature has endowed different portions of the 
earth's surface with different resources of use to man. Some 
portions -he has made favorable to one class of industries, other 

portions to another class: In certain portions, for example, she 

has placed rich deposits of iron ore. and in juxtaposition thereto 

the coal and limestone required in its reduction. In those por- 



THE NEXT STEP 167 

tions, therefore, the manufacture of pig iron, and steel ingots, 
and of articles manufactured therefrom, can be carried on with 
less labor than is required in parts of the earth's surface where 
the conditions of mining and smelting are less favorable. Simi- 
larly she has rendered certain other portions particularly well 
suited to the manufacture of porcelain, leather, wood-pulp, or 
other articles of commerce, and other portions she has adapted 
to the growth of cotton, or wheat, or potatoes, etc. Now it is 
obvious that articles of commerce can be produced with least 
labor in those portions of the earth which nature has adapted 
best to their production, and the free trader claims that free 
trade, through the free play of competition, will make indus- 
tries gravitate to * those parts of the earth which are thus best 
suited to their operation. Protection, on the other hand, by 
artificial interference with trade, really enriches nobody since, 
if a country is best adapted to the production of a given 
commodity, free trade will insure that it shall be produced there, 
whereas if it is not adapted, the attempt to produce the com- 
modity is attended with more labor than would have been re- 
quired had the country confined its efforts to producing products 
which by nature it was adapted to produce, and exchanging them 
for the given commodity with some country which was better 
adapted to produce it. I believe this to be a fair epitome of 
the argument for free trade. To those who have read what 
is remarked on this subject on pages 150 to 153 its fallacy will be 
obvious. The facilities afforded by nature constitute but one 
of the factors which enter into the labor cost or the money cost 
of commodities. By sufficient oppression of the sentient factor 
of production it is easy to compensate for very great differ- 
ences in natural adaptability ; hence success in competition, which 
is a function of money cost, affords no criterion by which we 
may judge of the relative natural advantages of two countries 
— it tells us nothing about relative labor cost. It is only when 
natural advantages are very decided that free importation into 
a country whose standard of living is high, is admissible. For 
example, it would be absurd for Canada to attempt to grow 
its own oranges. Even assuming its standard of living to be 
higher than that of the United States it would be cheaper in 
labor cost to import them from Florida or California than to 
attempt to grow them in hot houses, as the climate of Canada 
would require. It is worth observing that when free traders 
choose an example by which to emphasize the point of their doc- 



1G3 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

trine they generally seem to Beled Borne agricultural product 
in whose production, climate is a critical factor. 

Success in competition then affords no criterion by which 
to judge of iii»' labor cod of producing a given commodity, but 
a method of thus judging may nevertheless be suggested. It 
should be the policy of the United States, on assuming the pro- 
duction of a given commodity (A) under pantocracy, nol only 
to prohibit the importation of thai commodity, but to Ei 
proclaim its intention of abandoning said prohibition and said 
production in favor of any country which would meel the fol- 
lowing conditions : (1) Adopt and maintain a pantocratic 
tem of production, qoI necessarily identical in every detail with 
our own, hut deliberately designed to increase the efficiency both 
of production and consumption. (2) Prove it- ability to pro- 
duce said commodity (A) at a less labor cost, by producing and 
delivering it in the United States at a less money cost than that 
required here, alter bringing the wage earners engaged in its 
production there to the same level of consumption as those en- 

! in its production here — thai is, to the same real v 
and same hours of labor. This process I shall call the equaliza- 
tion of the sentient factor of production. (">) Provide a market 
for some other commodity or commodities whose labor cost here 
would, under the same system, be less than there: said market 
t<> be substantially as great as that provided by the United States 
for commodity (A), did- policy embodies the utilitarian theory 
of free trade. It provide- for the determination of the relative 
natural advantages of two or more nation- in the production of 
any commodity by comparison of the relative money cost of that 
commodity in said nation-, not under conditions of unequal 
economy of consumption, as is the case with ordinary free trade, 
but under conditions of equal economy. It provides that the low 
• of a commodity shall really represent the great nat- 
ural advantages utilized in the production thereof, and not the 
low standard of living imposed upon the producers thereof. In 
addition to this ii requires a market in exchange U*v that aban- 
doned here, since otherwise the United States could export no 
commodities in exchange for those imported. This would result 
in an unfavorable balance of trade, ami the final loss by the 
United States of all it- gold, which, in the absence of a market 
for anything else, it would bo forced to export in exchange for 
imports. Such a condition would involve inconvenience, but 
e than thi-. it would involve the enforced migration of 
laborers who, deprived of their means o\' support here, would 



J THE NEXT STEP 169 

be forced to seek it elsewhere. It is not common sense thus to 
force men to follow an industry out of a country. Industries 
should be the servants, not the masters, of men, and it is better 
to submit to a slightly increased labor cost than to force unwill- 
ing migration. The happiness involved is the only criterion in 
judging of this as of any policy. It is well to locate an industry 
where it is most favored by nature ; but it is better to locate it 
where it will produce the most happiness, and in selecting the 
locality of any industry the second consideration should always 
prevail over the first — provided, of course, there is any conflict 
between them. 

The mutual interchange of markets under utilitarian free 
trade would obviously be an advantage to both nations taking 
part therein, since the very conditions of exchange require 
that it shall be accomplished only when it involves a decrease 
in the labor cost of all the commodities concerned. The mode 
of effecting the exchange of markets should and could be made 
to exclude all disturbance in the labor market of both countries. 
Suppose, for example, upon careful examination by experts it is 
discovered that, under a pantocratic system, the labor cost of 
producing commodities A, B, and C, in the United States is less 
than that involved in their production in Germany under a sim- 
ilar system, and that the labor cost of commodities D, E, and F, 
is less in Germany than in the United .States; the markets for 
said commodities being essentially the same. Unless the labor 
cost of transportation nullified these differences, Germany, by 
agreement with the United States would cease to produce com- 
modities A, B, and C — the United States would cease to pro- 
duce commodities D, E, and P — all restrictions upon the im- 
portation of these commodities being, of course, removed. In 
order not to disturb the labor market, however, the exchange of 
commodity markets should not be effected suddenly, but as the 
plants in Germany engaged in the production of commodities A, 

B, and C, were dismantled, those engaged in D, E, and P would 
be erected and the same labor, though not necessarily the same 
wage earners, formerly engaged in the production of A, B, and 

C, would, without interruption, proceed to engage in the produc- 
tion of D, E, and F. Similar operations would occur simul- 
taneously in the United States. Besides this, such parts of the 
machinery for producing the respective commodities as were 
worth while transporting could be exchanged between the two 
countries, and thus the labor cost of re-erecting the plants in 
more favorable situations minimized. As the whole transaction 



170 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

would be earned cml deliberately and after thorough investigation 
by experts of it- total effed upon both production and con- 
sumption, and as neither nation would have anything to gain 
by concealmenl or misrepresentation, nothing bul good could 

ill to both nations, and the exchange would be a mutual bene- 
fit. The contrast of Buch a sane and common sense mode of 

ing advantage of natural facilities with the destructive and 
chaotic method involved in the laissez fewre policy of free trade, 
is too obvious to require comment. The latter attains its objed 
only after the sentient factor of production has been oppressed 
to the point of exhaustion — the former requires a- a condition 
of it- consummation that means deliberately designed for the 
emancipation of the sentient factor shall he adopted before the 
exchange of markets shall occur. The United States, on account 
of it- vast market and it< extraordinary natural advantages, occu- 
pies a unique position. It is by nature adapted to play the part 
of the greatesl nation on earth, because by the proper use of 
it- natural advantages it can contribute more to the happin 
of humanity than any other nation. Should it adopt the laissez 
faire policy of free trade it would simply employ its unique 
position to contribute to the unhappiness of humanity. Supp< 
it should adopt that policy, what would happen? Every indus- 
trial nation in the world under the capitalistic system would 
bend every effort to capture its vast markets; each would vie 
with the other, not only in introducing improvements in the 

3, hut in oppressing Labor to the breaking point. The labor- 
ing population of industrial Europe and of the United Stal 
in competition therewith, would engage in a death struggle lor 
commercial supremacy — the products of industry would be 
coined in agony — and year by year conditions would become 
worse as each nation tried to bankrupt its competitors; and 
what would be the end? Other things being equal, that nation 
would win whose population could be forced to the lowest level of 
living and the maximum misery per capita — it would probably 
win even from the nation possessing the greatesl natural advan- 

es, provided that nation were peopled by men who would nol 
or could not live bo cheaply and Labor so long. Such a policy 
would hut put a premium upon the oppression of labor, and while 
forcing down the standard of living in Europe, it would force it 
down in the Dnited States as well. It would he an invitation 
i- every industrial nation on earth to outdo it< neighbor in 
oppressing the sentient factor of production. 

On the other hand, what would he the effect should the United 



THE NEXT STEP 171 

States adopt a system of pantocracy, and at the same time its 
logical concomitant, the utilitarian policy of free trade. It 
would be an invitation issued to all the world to emancipate its 
people. That nation and that nation only whose policy was 
guided by the economy of happiness could hope to capture the 
markets of the United States, or to benefit by its great natural 
advantages. It would put a premium, not upon the oppression, 
but upon the uplifting, of wage earners, and would divert the 
ingenuity and effort of the directing class abroad, as well as at 
home, from expedients to defeat the demands and aspirations 
of the laboring class to expedients for so improving the arts 
of production as to accomplish the very object for which the 
laboring population are everywhere striving. While recognizing 
the fundamental truth at the foundation of the ordinary theory 
of free trade, pantocracy would employ that recognition to ac- 
complish the end of utility. It would make the capture of our 
markets by foreign countries, as well as the capture of foreign 
markets by our own, depend upon success in the exploitation of 
the non-sentient instead of the sentient factor of production, by 
making the equalization of the sentient factor a condition thereof. 
It would freely recognize the importance of everywhere taking 
advantage of the bounty of nature, and for that very reason would 
insist that success in the capture of the world's markets, so far 
as the United .States could affect the matter, should really be 
determined by the bounty of nature, and not by the misery of 
man. This is the true theory of reciprocity, for the exchange of 
markets under such conditions would bring benefit to all nations 
without bringing harm to any, and moreover it is but consistently 
carrying out the general policy of pantocracy of saving the sen- 
tient at the expense of the non-sentient factor of production; 
for to so readjust industry as to make more accessible to man- 
kind the most available resources of nature is equivalent to in- 
creasing the availability of her resources by the improvement 
of machinery, and has a similar effect upon the economy of pro- 
duction. 

Incidentally our exposition of the utilitarian theory of free 
trade shows why, in the pantocratic scheme expounded in Chap- 
ter 4, no provision was made for exploiting foreign markets. 
What is the use, under pantocracy, of producing a lot of articles 
we do not want, and then having to dispose of them abroad, in 
order to postpone (for it does not prevent) a crisis from over- 
production ? The United States can exercise no control over the 
tariff or other policies of foreign countries under the present 



17l> THE POLI! tCS OF UTILITY 

tern, and an industry depending for its market upon foreig 
trade may be thrown out of gear at any time by a change in 
policy i >reign country. A foreign trade (unl< 

under i itions jusl expounded) would preclude the adap- 

tation of the --apply to the demand and would thus throw the 
pantocratic inism into disorder. Except as a mean- of 

obtaining articles, such as coffee and spices, which she docs not 
attempt to produce at all, the Tinted States has no more need 
of a trade with foreign countries than the earth has need of 
a trade with Mai--. Product- such as those mentioned, not pro- 
ducible in the United States, should be, as now, obtained by 

bange for those produced here; and the trade in such com- 
modities should he the only trade with countries too unenlight- 
ened to adopt a pantocratic system. 

Success in imposing upon other countries the recognition and 
practice of the economy of happiness would have remote effects 
even more valuable to humanity than the immediate effect in- 
volved in the mutually advantageous exchange of markets. By 
raising the standard of living and of education abroad the same 
effect wotdd he produced there as here, viz., suspension of the 
Law of Malthus. By the powerful effect of a pantocratic system 
upon the law of increasing returns the pressure of the population 
upon its means of subsistence and of happiness would be relieved 
— it would no longer he necessary for the inhabitants of for- 

;i lands to seek relief from misery by exile. Emigration 
would cease because the necessity for it would disappear. Thus 
by its immigration and trade policy OUT country would not only 
insure it- own posterity against over-population, hut it would 
make relief from over-population in other countries the very 
of i ! at insurance. The unequal pressure of population is 
of migration, and to permanently dispense with the 
necessity of migration the pressure must be equalized. The 
■i immigration policy of the United States proposes to 
equalize it by increasing the pressure here — the proposed panto- 
cratic policy wotdd equalize it by i './// it abroad. Of 
what u-«' is it to give a few immigrants temporary relief from 
the burden of over-population only to produce finally the very 
conditions here Erom which they sought, and are seeking, to 

tape abroad. Their temporary relief only insures to their 
posterity and our- permanent impossibility of relief. 1 f through 
improved facilities of communication the unoccupied areas of 
the earth are, in the next few generations, to be populated as 
densely a- Europe or china, what i- to become of the numberless 



THE NEXT STEP 173 

generations which are to follow ? The time is rapidly approach- 
ing when relief from over-population cannot be obtained from 
migration unless we establish communication with the moon. 
The United States should not permit the transient effect of 
immigration upon the actual immigrants themselves to blind 
it to the permanent effect thereof upon posterity. The impulse 
to relieve the misery we see is a commendable one ; but the mis- 
ery we do not see is as real as that we see. We shall not live 
to witness the full measure of misery which posterity must pay 
for our present policy, but our failure to witness it will not 
reduce its poignancy one iota. The misery we relieve now by 
that policy is not as a drop in the bucket to that which will be 
caused by it hereafter. It may gratify our impulses to relieve 
the poor immigrant fleeing from the over-population of Europe, 
but what right have we to secure such gratification at the cost 
of the embittered lives of future generations? It is profoundly 
unjust thus to allow sentiment to dominate reason. It is the 
merest pathomania and no less dangerous than dogma. 

Paralleling the argument for unrestricted immigration arising 
from short-sighted sentiment, there is another having its origin 
in religious dogma which, if consistently applied, would lead 
back to fatalism. Thus, it is often remarked that men should 
not meddle with the interests of posterity, because though those 
interests may be affected by their acts, the effects are not imme- 
diately observable, and such matters should be left to the care 
of God, the assumption being that God will attend to that which 
man neglects. This is perhaps the last concretely baneful reli- 
gious dogma which survives in the western world. It is applied 
under various circumstances where no other pretext can be con- 
veniently cited as justification for a prevailing custom. Of 
course it is never consistently applied, since if it is indeed safe 
to leave things to the care of God, one thing can be as safely 
left to His care as another, and neither men nor nations would 
need to take thought for the morrow, but could trust to Heaven 
for food, raiment, and protection from the elements. Labor 
could be dispensed with, and it could be said of men as of the 
lilies "They toil not neither do they spin/* and yet are pro- 
vided for by the Creator. How fallible man is enabled to dis- 
tinguish those things which it is safe to leave to God from those 
which it is not, is a question which must be left to such persons 
as possess supernatural means of communication with the Author 
of the Universe But this much is certain — if their counsel 
prevails and leads to the neglect of the immigration problem^ 
12 



174 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

posterity must pay a mighty price for the ignorance of their 
ancestry. Experience teaches that there is no more reason to 
believe in the intervention of God to prevent the misery of i 

pity than to prevent the poverty, and crime, and dishonor. 
which we observe about us. To attempt to place the responsibil- 
ity for human inaction upon God is a dismal piece of superstition. 
If the world is to be successful in the production of happi 
musl be through the voluntary acts of man, and God will not 
nullify his negligence in one department of conduct more than 
in another. The law of increasing population and its dir 
consequence, the law of increasing migration, cannot be count - 
acted by neglect. To attempt to follow the policy of drift in 
the future, as it has been followed in the past; to attempt to 
equalize the pressure of population upon subsistence by inert 
ing its fined pressure, instead of decreasing its initial pressure is 
hopeless, because it leaves the operation of the Law of Malthus 
intact. It will hut hasten the day when the population of the 
earth attains natural, instead of beneficent, equilibrium. It will 
hut reduce the whole world to a common level of misery, and 

" Shut the gates of mercy on mankind." 

Besides its effect upon terrestrial over-population, the recip- 
rocal exchange of markets under pantocracy would have an effect 
upon international amity and union only less beneficent, because 
as each great nation fell into its natural place as an interna- 
tional producer of those commodities which it was by nature 
besl fitted to produce, the interdependence of nations would in- 
crease, and the incentive to international strife would disappear 
with the disappearance of the occasion therefor. With the ex- 
tension of the organization of industry under pantocracy the 
departments of output regulation, distribution, etc., would be- 
come international instead of national, since not otherwise could 
the Bupply be adjusted to the demand. Cnstead of striving 

outdo its fellow aations in the world's markets, each nation 
would strive to outdo its fellows in raising the level of its own 
happiness, for this would he the condition of capturing th< 
market-. That is, the self-interest of each nation would become 
identical with the self-interest of all nations. This is obviously 
no more than the principle of pantocracy applied to the rela- 
tione of nation-. With such an international policy war would 
become extremely improbable since no nation seeks to wage war 
upon it- own interests, and having once entered into the relation- 



THE NEXT STEP 175 

of mutual interdependence implied in the utilitarian policy of 
free trade, the interests of the great nations of the earth would 
become identical, and any nation entering into war with its 
neighbors would, by that act, deprive itself of things essential 
to its life, or happiness, or both. Thus pantocracy would seek 
to attain universal peace by so adjusting the relations of nations 
as to make them have everything to lose and nothing to gain 
by war, and an essential part of its policy would consist in so 
directing education that not only would this be the case, but that 
everyone would know that it was the case, and would govern his 
conduct accordingly. As with individuals, so with nations, it 
would seek to divert the power of self-interest from destructive 
into constructive channels, since to abolish self-interest entirely 
is out of the question. Thus patriotism would become identical 
with humanitarianism, and the sentiment of Thomas Paine 
would become that of every patriot : " The world is my coun- 
try and to do good is my religion." 

This is but a recognition of the assertion made in Chapter 3 x 
that the distribution of pleasure and pain in space or time is of 
no consequence. It matters not when or by whom these sensa- 
tions are felt, whether now or a thousand years hence, whether 
by white man, black man, dog, toad, or worm ; the form, size, or 
constitution of tissues of the sentient being concerned have 
nothing to do with the question. Intensity and duration are 
the only factors which may justly be considered. There is in 
the universe but one good and that is happiness, and there is 
but one evil and that is unhappiness : all things else are to be 
deemed good or evil only because of their relation to these 
through the law of causation. To contradict this assertion 
either leaves the words good and evil without any useful mean- 
ing, or it deprives them of all meaning whatever. 

Here ceases our exposition of the economy of happiness. As 
a treatise on the technology of that subject it is primitive and 
incomplete, but as it is the first of its kind, perhaps no more 
can be expected of it. When contrasted with treatises of a 
future generation, I hope and I expect, that it will appear a poor 
and feeble thing. I believe, however, that, as a structure, it 
will stand. Its details doubtless will be profoundly modified and 
amplified, but its principles appear to be as eternal as the struc- 
ture of the mind from which they are deduced. This convic- 

i Of The Economy of Happiness. 



176 THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

lion may bo a delusion. If BO, the sooner it is overthrown the 
better, and none will be readier to assi$1 in its overthrow than 
: ie who now sustains it. Science cannot live on delusions, 
dogmatism cannot live on anything else, and if the pres- 
enl work is infected with dogma, let no method oi' disinfection 
known to the candid critic be spared. 

But before the system herein submitted is judged, one point 
should be brought to a distinct focus in the critic's mind. Any 
rion of criticism, whether applied to art or agriculture, to 
potatoes or politics, to mud-pies or morals, must be either in- 
tuitionistic or it must not. If it is, then the ultimate dictum 
of criticism can be no more than "I like it" or "I don't like 
it." With such a criterion there are no issues except between 
individual tastes, and to dispute about a right or a wrong — a 
better or a worse — whether in morals or anything else, is idle, 
since de gustibus non est disputandum. lie who fails to clearly 
comprehend this truth is ignorant of the A B of criticism. If, 
on the other hand, the criterion employed is not intuitionistic, it 
must be utilitarian, or founded on some other distinction in ex- 
perience as independent of approval and disapproval as is the 
criterion of utility. As already shown, (p. 251 ) l such a distinc- 
t ion no one has ever deemed it worth while to seek, nor is any one 
likely to. Hence the criterion of utility is the only one by which 
any system may usefully be judged, and directed by that criterion 
lontroversy of keen and discriminating criticism becomes the 
champagne of philosophy. , 

But of the many varieties of criticism by intuition there is 
one requiring neither discrimination nor keenness which may 
as well be anticipated, since no proposed innovation has ever 
escaped it and none ever will. T refer to that form of censure 
which labels all new proposals " impractical." Critics subject to 
infirmity confound the impractical with the uncustomary. 
They assume that what they cannot conceive, the universe cannot 
realize. They limit the capacity of all human effort by their 
own. Every age has had critics of this calibre and none ie 
moner to-day than the political pessimist who complains that 

is really no use in trying to do anything to the presenl 

ation except apply a few palliatives, warranted to disturb no 

ctable gentleman in the enjoymenl of his immemorial privi- 

They admit that the world progresses, but only at a rate, 

and in a direction, which they are peculiarly fitted to prescribe. 

i Of Tiio Ecpnomy of Happio 






THE NEXT STEP 177 

These critics, I am sure, will be able to tell "by intuition" 
that the proposals herein put forth are impractical. They are 
of the same class as those who, by the sound of the name, can 
tell that, socialism is impractical. But can any presumption be 
established that the judgment of these men is such as to afford 
a safe guide to the conduct of society? Are their attainments 
and training of the character required, and do they approach the 
subject with an open mind? Have the distinctions and prin- 
ciples herein set forth been long familiar to their meditations, 
and are the doctrines founded upon them rejected by critics 
whose mature judgment has weighed them in the balance and 
found them wanting? By no means. The men who make 
" practicalness " the test of every proposed system are fitted 
neither by training nor judgment to apply that test. They 
consist of pedagogues whose highest ambition is to teach what 
they have been taught, editors dominated by the dogmas of a past 
generation, law-givers whose political philosophy is a mitigated 
anarchy, business men who mistake a knowledge of finance for 
omniscience. If their private cogitations have been centered long 
upon the technics of human happiness no one has ever suspected 
it. They are political mystics who use the terms liberty, 'pros- 
perity, patriotism, public welfare, justice, as their metaphysical 
prototypes use the terms substance, noumenon, thing-in-itself, 
ego — not as signs of, but as substitutes for, ideas. As critics, 
they are of that common class 

"Who now to sense, now nonsense leaning, 
Mean not, but blunder round about a meaning." 

It is scarcely possible that they can be practical — since if the 
word practical is to be employed in any useful meaning the prac- 
tical man is one who adapts his means to his ends ; hence in order 
that he who would adapt the means of society to its end may be 
practical, the first requisite is that he shall know what that end 
is; and this is just what no critic of the prevailing school of econ- 
omy does know. Therefore, he cannot be practical. It may be 
that the dogmatic critic can show common sense to be " imprac- 
tical," but in order to do so he must first emasculate his term. 

Perhaps it may be deemed impractical — as it certainly is un- 
customary — to begin a work on political philosophy with an 
analysis of common sense. Is it impractical because everyone 
understands the nature of common sense "by intuition," or be- 
cause political philosophy - requires no such foundation ? If 



ITS THE POLITICS OF UTILITY 

everyone does understand common sense how is it that most of 
as discover that other people have an aggravating habit of de- 
parting from it ; and it' politic;)] philosophy is not to be founded 
on common sense, on what is it to be founded? Does the eritie 
in thai a shallower foundation would he a surer one? [g 
superficiality a guarantee of security? There appears to be a 
pular idea thai in such a "practical" thing as politic- the 
superficial man is the safest, bul that in engineering, or navi- 
gation, or medicine, he is not. Such a delusion is not derived 
from experience, though it is well adapted to furnish nations 
with experience sufficient to correct it. Those who are subject 
to this delusion arc usually subject to another, viz.. that the 
practical man is not a theorist. The doctrines of the economy 
of happiness therefore being theories, must be impractical, but 
they ignore the palpable fact that as opponents of those theories 
they are themselves theorists, since a political theory can be 
opposed only by advocating one of its alternatives. And advo- 
cates of any of the alternatives of pantocracy, except socialism, 
are not only theorists — not only advocates of a theory — but 
of a theory absurd wpriori and aposteriori — not only wrong in 
principle, but a failure in practice. No political theory thus far 
put in operation has been anything but a failure — none has 
ever produced a permanent surplus of happiness — and none 
ever will until morality, political and personal, is recognized 
within the domain of common sense. When that time comes, 
politics will take its place with applied mechanics, electricity, 
arid chemistry, as a branch of technology, and will become as 
thoroughly revolutionized as were alchemy, astrology, and the 
other varieties of mysticism from which the sciences of to-day 

have hern evolved. 

It is a view very commonly held that, somehow or other, sci- 
ence will better the existing order of things — and so it will — 
bul in bo doing it will apply the methods it has always applied; 
it will proceed by definite steps in a definite direction. Science 
has already done more for humanity than the sum of all the 
oilier forces -<'t in morion by human effort. In her achieve- 
ments, to (pioie Archdeacon Farrar, 

". . . there is not only beauty and wonder, but also hencfi- 
cence and power. It is not only that she has revealed to us infinite 
space crowded with unnumbered worlds; infinite time peopled by 
unnumbered existences; infinite organisms hitherto invisible but 
full of delicate and iridescent loveliness bul also that she lias 



THE NEXT STEP 179 

been, as a great Archangel of Mercy, devoting herself to the 
service of man. She has labored, her votaries have labored, not 
to increase the power of despots, or to add to the magnificence of 
courts, but to extend human happiness, to economize human effort, 
to extinguish human pain. Where of old, men toiled, half blinded 
and half naked, in the mouth of the glowing furnace to mix the 
white-hot iron, she now substitutes the mechanical action of the 
viewless air. She has enlisted the sunbeam in her service to limn 
for us, with absolute fidelity, the faces of the friends we love. 
She has shown the poor miner how he may work in safety, even 
amid the explosive fire-damp of the mine. She has, by her 
anaesthetics, enabled the sufferer to be hushed and unconscious 
while the delicate hand of some skilled operator cuts a fragment 
from the nervous circle of the unquivering eye. She points not 
to pyramids built during weary centuries by the sweat of miser- 
able nations, but to the lighthouse and the steamship, to the rail- 
road and the telegraph. She has restored eyes to the blind and 
hearing to the deaf. She has lengthened life, she has minimized 
danger, she has controlled madness, she has trampled on disease." 

And this is but the beginning — these are merely the incidental 
achievements of a power destined to convert the present material 
civilization into a moral one. If civilization is one-sided and 
materialistic it is only because science has not yet taken posses- 
sion of her legitimate province — morality. When she does, the 
moral civilization of the future will have dawned, and the long 
night of dogma will be over. Mankind have always hoped for 
happiness, and they have hoped in vain. If they will but follow 
common sense their hope, by fulfilment, will be converted into 
expectation. Science will solve the problem which metaphysics 
and theology have tried but failed to solve, and unlike her prede- 
cessors she will not be satisfied to offer a pain-ridden world those 
empty substitutes for a solution — 

" That keep the word of promise to our ear, 
And break it to our hope." 

Morality is the last citadel of the dynasty of dogma. That 
citadel once captured by common sense, truth will replace un- 
truth, and right will replace wrong Men will at last be free t ) 
seek the one eternal aspiration of the human heart, unappalled 
by the hideous idols of ignorance and asceticism, and un- 
enthralled by the stolid custodians of imperial or sacerdotal 
authority, whose combined power has wrought the tragedy of 
history. Suffering will no longer be the portion of sentience, 
and the morality of happiness will rule the conscience and the 
conduct of mankind, world without end. 



OCT 17 I 






THE 



POLITICS OF UTILITY 



By 
James Mackaye 



BOSTON 
LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY 

1906 



